Cannot post

Hi Philo,
Thanks for the back up,I was beggining to wonder if I was on my own on this one!As for being sat next to me,I was only at the show on the Saturday,sorry I missed you.I did think about coming back for the sunday display,but my brother had other plans,so that was that.

Digby,
I beg to differ and suggest that Ant’s eysight is in perfect working order.
I was at the far eastern end on Sunday, a few feet from the press enclosure (must have been sat next to you Ant?) and I can assure you that some aircraft flew over our heads. On more than one occasion I had to turn around a face the HAC building to get the aircraft in frame when taking pictures. Thats why I go to that end as the best pictures are generally to be had there.
I’m not complaining merely endorsing what has already been said.
I have to confess that I did survey the crash site with bino’s but as I said in an earlier post this was so as I could direct my slient respects in my way.

“Ant Harrington I suggest you get your eyesight tested, and if you enjoy going to airshows then innaccurate posts like yours could only harm the movement.”

Digby,
I have no intention of damaging the airshow movement or criticising pilots etc,I’m simply pointing out what I saw.Where were you standing?I was pretty much at the eastern extremety of the crowdline,and so I’d say I was pretty well qualified to say what was going on at that end of the field.When four whacking great piston engine fighters are heading straight at you,you tend to know about it!

“I doubt, in fact I know the aircraft were not over the crowd at legends as if they were the airshow comittee and CAA monitor would have red carded the offending pilot.”

It IS possible for the CAA’s display inspectors to miss something occasionally.Damien has already stated that from his (western) end of the field,they did not appear to infringe the crowdline,so who knows how it looked from various locations around the field. I know that myself and a number of others in the crowd around me did not feel safe at times.

As a final point about damage to the airshow movement,which do you consider more damaging-someone like me making a comment about aircraft being too near the crowd in the hope that it might make one or two people think about it,or an aircraft ploughing into spectators because nobody dared bring up thier concerns previously??

I do not know how things stood at the weekend but there is a reference in the AAIB report on the P38 that the display line was the southern edge of the grass runway. I cannot imagine it has moved any closer.
Does anyone know where the line is?

Well said Steve,
I doubt, in fact I know the aircraft were not over the crowd at legends as if they were the airshow comittee and CAA monitor would have red carded the offending pilot.
I noticed on the Sunday at the side of the 505 there were some sickos with ultra long lenses pointing at the area of the crash site, now that was sick. also I wonder how many sickos were trying to see if they could see the crash site from the crowd line with the super long lenses.
Ant Harrington I suggest you get your eyesight tested, and if you enjoy going to airshows then innaccurate posts like yours could only harm the movement.

A couple of minor points, the land warfare hall is pretty much where the Miles Student ended up after engine failure in the mid 80’s. A one off I grant you.

During landing in a long nosed warbird, such as a Spit or P51 a curved approach is preferable (so I’m told, never having piloted one) as the pilot can keep the runway in view for the majority of the approach, come in straight and the runway effectively disappears long before you have reached it (very disconcerting as a passenger), fine if its a massive concrete slab, but not fun if it’s a small grass thing hiding amongst other less aircraft friendly grass.

Duxford is different to many air display venues in that the crowd line isn’t straight – the eastern and western ends are therefore closer to the display line than crowd centre. I would imagine therefore that the CAA would specify that the display line should be ‘x’ metres from these two points rather from crowd centre, therefore maintaining the minimum allowable seperation.

However, because the grass runway is crowd side of the hard, I guess it might actually lie crowd side of the display line, in which case aircraft departing from – and arriving on – the grass will appear to be very close. But I doubt very much that the CAA would have allowed this situation to continue as it has for so many years if it were not deemed to be safe. Don’t forget that an aircraft is not manouvring during it’s take off run or final approach, these are the lowest speed phases of any flight, where any turns will degrade your speed and bring you that much closer to the dreaded stall, therefore any pilot will be doing his level best to go straight ahead. Which is also exactly what they’d do with an engine failure on take off – plonk the thing down straight ahead.

I was at the east end of the crowd line and didn’t notice so much with the flying display but more so when the ‘Merlin’ Spits took off from the grass runway, they were very close to us… seemed fab at the time but in retrospect an engine failure at that height couldn’t been very messy..

I know it sounds overstated,but they really were over the crowd at the eastern end where I was standing.I don’t know how low they were,but my gut feeling told me they were low enough!
I am quite surprised that the CAA don’t seem to have said anything about it,but perhaps there were no CAA guys down at our end of the airfield to notice it.
I am not trying to knock the warbird movement or the professionalism of the pilots etc etc,it’s just that we can’t afford to have an accident near the crowd.Crashes anywhere are bad enough,but one that involves casualties among the spectators would really put the future of displays in jeapordy,and I feel it’s important that we keep displays as safe as possible.It can never be said that there won’t be an accident,whatever the condition of the aircraft or ability of the pilot.

Re: Cannot post

Originally posted by tonydyer
just ask someone how high an aircraft is and they will missguess it

Often yes, but maybe not always?

don’t you hate it when that happens? I have written a reply to several threads several times over 40 mins and it refused to post and now it does under a completely irrelevant silly title…..sorry all chaps and chapesses…..I need a Spitfire ale.