Hello all,

For the chaps wanting the info on the Black Six Crash

- Ham.

S T U R M O V I K - T E C H N I K A

Hi Corvid,

>I am not familiar with the "Black Six" incident... what was?

"Black Six" is a Me 109G-2 owned by the British Gouvernment that was restored to airworthy status and flown in the airshow circuit for a few years.

On its last flight before being returned to static display, the pilot accidentally disabled the automatic radiator flap control, causing the engine to overheat during the airshow. When glycol steam poured out of the engine, he mistook it for smoke from oil and came in for a faster than usual landing as he expected the engine to seize. He overshot the runway, but had planned his approach so that he'd be able to lift off again, hop over the adjacent road at the runway end, and land on the meadow on the other side of the road. Unfortunately, the far end of the meadow had been ploughed, so his gear sunk in and he flipped over at low speed.

The pilot escaped OK (and, being trapped in the cockpit, actually signalled the firemen not to cut him free to save the aircraft.) The aircraft fuselage received some serious damage that would have made it a write-off in the 1940s, but being a rare museum exhibit, it was perfectly restored, though for static display only.

(I think the airframe would allow flight, but for static display they fitted it with authentic components like the original fuel tank that are not suited for flight anymore.)

The irony is that the original cowl flap control as fitted by Messerschmitt ("automatic - off - open - close") invited misoperation as the lever was off by some 30° compared to the labels indicating its status.

Regards,

Henning (HoHun)

HoHun

Thanks for the info on that... I had no knowledge (redundant i know). A somewhat similar event, with results most dire, happened in Sacramento many years ago.

During an airshow at Executive airport, an F86 flamed on take off and slammed into an icecream shop. Many, many kids died.

In the years hence, an elaborate shopping center was erected, and heavily attended, on the site of the crash.

No problems until some major chain wanted to start an ice cream parlor in the shopping center.

Many petitions expressing outrage.. protests.

I never had realized that Sabre jets were drawn so to crash on ice cream parlors.

corvid

Yes, this is a little known fact about the F86.

I was looking the technical documentation for the B and D versions and there
are no one reference for that.
The only one time I heard and read in the past that it was plannned for naval
version.
And there are many photos of ditched Ju-87s where gear is still present.

Probably there really was some amount of C-version for naval operations that had such feature, but most - hadn't it.

There is known one German WWII time photo where Stuka has no gear in level flight, but the comment for the photo is that the plane lost them in a deep dive. Something like this.




[This message has been edited by Oleg Maddox (edited 07-22-2002).]

Stookie fliegers were neither brave nor fearless.. but just plain PSYCHOTIC! and their Gunners were ALCOHOLICS!! hhmm wait or is that the other way around? Pilot Alcoholics and Gunners Psychotic.. hhmm well you get the picture.. and RUDEL is a prime example GOTTA LOVE THAT NUT CASE! btw no one ever mentions the Air Kills that the STOOKIE Pilots got now do they

------------------
Oberst Karl von Hess
Mit Gott, Fur Konig und Vaterland
I/JG52


-Clausewitz

Hi Oleg,

>There is known one German WWII time photo where Stuka has no gear in level flight, but the comment for the photo is that the plane lost them in a deep dive. Something like this.

This photograph was published in the Luftwaffe propaganda magazine "Der Adler" with the following caption:

"One of the dive bombers came too close to the water when pulling out during an attack on coastal fortifications whereby it lost the whole undercarriage and the airscrew was slightly bent. In that condition the machine returned in formation to the base airdrome more than 120 km. off and landed smoothly on the underside of the fuselage."

(The photo had a German and an English caption since at that time "Der Adler" was still sold in the USA. I quoted the English caption.)

"Der Adler" isn't necessarily a reliable source since it was a propaganda instrument. It might be that they wanted to emphasize the toughness of German aircraft and faked a story.

On the other hand, they might have told the truth :-)

Regards,

Henning (HoHun)