Ejection Seat Survival

Up until the late sixties there was no rocket assistance. They retrofitted the F-4 Phantom Martin-Baker Mk.5 seats with the M-B Mk.7, which had rocket assistance. This gave it zero-zero capability which was essential if strapped into a stationary aircraft which was on fire.

As a result, the gun (or catapult, as it was frequently referred to) could be less powerful, being needed only to provide the initial acceleration to clear the tail fin in flight so injuries were lessened. The rocket pack continued the acceleration to gain height sufficient for man/seat separation and parachute deployment from a standing start.

Early M-B (and other manufacturer’s too) non-rocket seats were justifiably called back-breakers and many injuries were sustained due to a less-than-perfect posture and the massive instantaneous ‘g’ when the ejection took place. However, it was better than staying with the aircraft! The limitations of what a man could stand when ejected with a gun only were at their limits and with the increasing speeds of aircraft and the requirement to be clear of the fin when in flight, it was essential and accepted that another solution needed to be found. Rocket assistance solved the problem and some crew members went through two or even three successful ejections with the later seats and survived to fly again.

Notwithstanding the above, whatever seat you ejected in, if you did it in anger it was going to be a hard ride – rocket powered or not.

Anon.

The Stencil seat in the A4 Skyhawk had a ballistic spread I.e a gas bottle within chute, which discharged upon deployment to almost instantly inflate it. A really good idea if you need to eject after a soft shot on the aircraft carrier catapult but it will break your neck if it goes off if you bail at 400+ knots. It had a nasty reputation for inadvertently going off and killing the pilot.

I remember another frightening incident where a double engine failure was experienced at low level and the pilot made a stunning dead stick landing in ploughed field, coming to rest with the cockpit under a tree. As the pilot then tried to exit the cockpit the ejector seat fired throwing him into the tree, with tragic results. Early sixties but I’ve no idea of the s/n.

My U. S.Navy friends used to call their seats of that era (1970s) Martin Baker Back-Breakers.

“I seem to remember an incident with a Harrier where the pilot departed but left the seat in the aircraft?
Was in an old copy of `Aircraft` magazine. The aircraft was flying on autopilot with no occupant. I don’t know if any reason was found.
I believe jets were scrambled to intercept but the plane eventually crashed.”

I think that you are describing the incident to Maj Schaffner USAF on 8th Sept 1970 in Lightning F.6 XS894.

Edit – not the following Lightning – Creaking Door has it with ZD325 – Ross

To quote W/C Spry

“The wreckage was located nearly 2 months later with surprisingly little damage. The canopy was attached and closed, and there was no sign of the pilot. The aircraft appeared to have struck the sea at a low speed, planed the surface and come to rest comparitively slowly. The ejection seat handle had been pulled to the full extent allowed by the interruptor link in the main gun sear. (The interruptor link ensures that the seat does not fire unless the canopy has gone). The canopy gun sear had been withdrawn but the cartridge had not been struck with sufficient force to fire it (during servicing the firing unit had been incorrectly seated because of damaged screw heads). The canopy had been opened normally, the QRB was undone, as was the PEC, and the PSP lanyard had been released from the life jacket.

It was concluded that the difficult task, carried out in rushed circumstances, combined with a lack of training in this profile, led to the pilot failing to monitor his height while slowing down. He had inadvertently flown into the sea but had attempted to recover the situation by selecting reheat; this was ineffective with the tail skimming the water. He attempted to eject, but this was unsuccessful due to the canopy failing to jettison. He then manually abandoned the aircraft, but was never found. He was, therefore, presumed to have drowned during or after his escape.”

Regards
Ross

In the case of the Harrier GR5 uncommanded ejection I think there was speculation that part of the seat ejection sequence fired when the pilot lowered the seat onto a foreign object (pen torch?) while flying towards a low sunset. Not so-much an ejection failure as the seat remained in the aircraft but the unfortunate pilot was ‘ejected’ onto his parachute through the (not detonated) canopy.

The aircraft flew-on and was intercepted by a United States Air Force transport aircraft; it eventually ran out of fuel and crashed into the sea west of Ireland.

Being that the JP was civvy, the seat would have been deactivated so falls (see what I did there?) outwith the scope of this question.

Yes, I forgot it was a deactivated seat!

The Argentine Canberra crew shot-down by a Sea Harrier were never found so presumably died of exposure. The Argentine Helicopter sent to search for them was shot-down by a Sea Dart missile from HMS Coventry.

Certainly at least one other Argentine pilot died of exposure after a successful ejection form an A4 Skyhawk (Stencil ejection-seat?) as his body was later washed-ashore in his dingy.

I seem to remember reading that there was some suggestion that the ejection-seats of the Argentine A4 Skyhawk fighter-bombers were in a poor state-of-repair due to a United States arms embargo (although the Argentines were apparently sourcing spare parts from Israel during the conflict). Certainly the successful ejection record of the Argentine A4 Skyhawk can best be described as appalling; one unit losing ten pilots killed from nine aircraft lost!

The discrepancy in the figure above can be explained by a tragic but possibly unique incident. An A4 Skyhawk returning damaged from a mission with hung-up bombs aboard ran off the runway on landing; fearing the worst when the undercarriage collapsed the pilot ejected. Sadly the pilot was killed (out-of-parameter ejection?) but the aircraft skidded to a halt on its under-wing drop-tanks and was only relatively lightly damaged.

I seem to remember an incident with a Harrier where the pilot departed but left the seat in the aircraft?
Was in an old copy of `Aircraft` magazine. The aircraft was flying on autopilot with no occupant. I don’t know if any reason was found.
I believe jets were scrambled to intercept but the plane eventually crashed.
That’s kind of off topic but interesting none the less.

Many thanks for the replies so far. Foreign bodies and unsecured seats fall into the `not a seat failure` category although the GR5 incident is a possible candidate.

The Argentinian crew during the Falklands must have died of exposure. They ejected from a Canberra (can’t remember if shot down by Harrier or Sea Cat?) and landed in the sea. A rescue helicopter was sent to find them but chased off by Harriers. They were never rescued.

There was no clear cause found in the case of the GR5 Harrier. A number of design changes were made by MB after the event to the seat type.

Being that the JP was civvy, the seat would have been deactivated so falls (see what I did there?) outwith the scope of this question.

Moggy

With refrence to the JP passenger incident, it seems the seat had not been secured back in the a/c as the top latch was not engaged after maintainence. This caused the canopy to become cracked as the seat moved up the rail during a negative G move. They replaced the canopy as it was cracked but failed to wonder why!!!!!!! The seat was still not locked to therail so during the next session of aeros which obviously were negative on the top it departed this time through the replaced canopy together with the occupant who was lucky in view of the harness not having been secured properly and ending up round his throat. However he remembered the manual release and completed it even though his harness was all to b++++++s.

There are plenty of reasons why the subject of a successful ejection may not survive; several Argentine aircrew successfully ejected during the Falklands Conflict but were not recovered alive from the sea.

Hyperthermia or other reasons?

I was trying to say “a seat that fired and left the aircraft but due to a technical failure resulted in loss of life…”

I think you need to be more specific. Loss of life due to seat failure rather than out-of-parameter use?

There are plenty of reasons why the subject of a successful ejection may not survive; several Argentine aircrew successfully ejected during the Falklands Conflict but were not recovered alive from the sea.

I can think of several cases of ejection-seat malfunction.

There was the case of the prototype Harrier GR5 where the pilot died when he was ejected through the canopy; a foreign-object caused part of the ejection-seat sequence to fire uncommanded.

There was the case of a Tornado F3 ejection-seat that malfunctioned and (I think?) deployed a parachute but the navigator was saved from being pulled from the aircraft because he had inadvertently secured himself to the aircraft with one of his leg-restraints!

There was the case of the Jet Provost where the passenger and ejection-seat fell from the aircraft when it was inverted. The passenger survived!

I think there was a case of an ejection-seat firing uncommanded during a very heavy landing of a BAe Hawk T1?

The seats and man-seat separation is automatic and immediate – unless above 10,000ft where a barostatic device will keep you in the seat until you reach 10k altitude.

If, however, you wish to separate from the seat above this height (for instance, if falling towards high ground) then there is a manual separation handle to allow you to do this.

Seat operation and parachute deployment is fully automatic and designed to assume occupant incapacitation.

Anon.

Yes, a poor choice of words. I was trying to say “a seat that fired and left the aircraft but due to a technical failure resulted in loss of life”
I accept it’s a `grey` question and could be interpreted in various ways.

I would like to broaden the question slightly and ask is it possible for the pilot to manually deploy the chute in the event the seat fails?
Can the pilot jettison the seat and manually pull the ripcord?

Can anyone confirm if there has ever been a successful ejection using a MB seat that resulted in loss of life.

What a bizarre use of the word ‘successful’

Moggy

As with any piece of equipment, it is the quality of the attention it received in its most recent service which determines its serviceability.

The Mk.10 seat is well proven and the design is not at fault, therefore it would be unfair to single out this incident. However, one of the essences of good design is that a component is designed in a way which minimises the effects of poor or faulty maintenance as much as possible, with minimal or no degredation of the original design performance.

A failure of the scissor shackle due to faulty maintenance procedures is beyond the manufacturer’s control but any safety-critical component (arguably the whole seat) should be able to be repaired/overhauled/replaced without complex setting up procedures being required or, at least, kept to a minimum.

Martin-Baker seats are brand leaders and amongst the best ejection seat manufacturer’s in the world. There has never been anything manufactured by anyone which has enjoyed a 100% success rate in operation – and ejection seats are no exception.

Anon.

So you could possibly exclude it from this discussion. Maintenance error (caused by the manufacturer), not necessarily the fault of the seat.

The actions of the pilot led to the seat firing .The scissor shackle was maintainance error due to lack of information from the manufacturer

Don’t know the answer, but it strikes me as a little unfair to limit the scope of this to Martin Baker seats. There are/have been other seat manufacturers. Some of them had their products replaced with MB seats during the service life of the aircraft in question.

The thread could be for any manufacturer. Living in the UK MB seemed more relevant (to me).