Handley page victor xl191

Planetags cut  the skin off and it went for scrap

The cockpit ended up being acquired by Walter Soplata. Where it went from there, I am not aware.

Just a small correction.  I was a sqn ldr and the Asst Air Adviser at the British Defence Liaison Staff in Ottawa and took a call at home one evening about the crash. I was sent down first to see the crew and the aircraft because the Air Adviser, Gp Capt Alan Tolhurst, was busy at the time.  I advised the crew about the convening of the Board of Inquiry and of their rights. They seemed very shaken and understandably anxious. I saw the aircraft which, after the bounces already described, had skidded left across the grass a long way before stopping, narrowly missing a concrete post I think.  The underside of the fuselage was obviously crushed but otherwise the airframe looked remarkably intact. I handed over to Alan Tolhurst when he arrived, before the arrival of the Board members from the UK.  I believe the aircraft had been intended to participate in the Toronto Air Show the next day, for which Alan and I were responsible for organising RAF participation. Alan later arranged donation of the cockpit to the CWH after it had been formally written off and I think he said the rest of the airframe was sold off at 5 cents a pound as scrap. Alan retired at the end of his tour in Canada and I believe now lives in South Yorkshire where he has been Chairman of the local NHS Trust and involved in Robin Hood Airport, previously RAF Finningley where he had been Stn Cdr.

XL191, you beat me to it! The incident is indeed still used today as “the classic” example in RAF CRM courses.

Intresting, thanks XL191. A sad ending to a great airplane!

XL191

Hi folks.

Just a couple of points to add to the original account of how this aircraft came to its unfortunate (and avoidable) end. As with many aviation incidents this had its roots much earlier in the flight, in fact the die was cast even before they got airborne when inadequate planning meant they left the UK with the wrong frequencies for the avionics leaving them unable to fly an instrument approach for the correct runway.

They dumped fuel (they were too heavy to land on the only runway available for a visual approach) before letting down over the water and then running in. In fact what they should have done was either divert elsewhere or make a trial approach to ascertain the cloudbase, execute a missed approach then dump fuel before making the second approach to land. It was suggested that the low-level sightseeing sector referred to by Deryk had left them with insufficient fuel to divert so they were committed to Hamilton.

By doing what they did they gave themselves only one shot at the approach and as we all now that went wrong. The subsequent enquiry revealed that the captain showed poor leadership and CRM (Crew Resource Management) by pressing on and not listening to his other crew members. On the final run-in for example they all suggested that he should just fly the aircraft (they were very low) while the rest of them scanned for the airfield through the windscreen but he insisted on doing both himself narrowly avoiding a water landing.

The list of errors is a long one and to this day this incident is a case study in how not to do it on RAF CRM courses.

Hi Robert,
Yes, I guess they were all getting on in age. I joined the RAF on a Short Service Commission as a Pilot in ’52, failed to make the cut due to colour vision problems and was offered a Nav job in V Bombers, which were then approaching service and, since they had two navs, there was a big push on to train more navs. I declined as I did not like the idea of riding in the back seat without an ejection capability!
D.

As a tekkie I must say that was a wise choice. Never forget, HP built 32 mk2’s, 32 different ways! They all had their foibles when I worked on them, still you did have to work on them and not just replace bits.

Thanks deryck

Good to hear some details from the source! I remember seeing it at the airshow and also when the cockpit was in the hangar. The cockpit still survives with walter soplata in ohio.

Victor crash.

Hi Robert,
Yes, I guess they were all getting on in age. I joined the RAF on a Short Service Commission as a Pilot in ’52, failed to make the cut due to colour vision problems and was offered a Nav job in V Bombers, which were then approaching service and, since they had two navs, there was a big push on to train more navs. I declined as I did not like the idea of riding in the back seat without an ejection capability!

Our info re the pilot came from the Air Attache, an Air Commodore, I think. We, of course, had a continuing relationship as he was our contact for RAF support for the Hamilton show. He was not amused that he had to drop everything and come to Hamilton on a summer weekend and then was stuck with a hastily convened Court of Inquiry. I guess they set them up ASAP while everything is fresh in everyone’s mind. He had other things to attend to rather than track the career of a pilot so he may have been assuming the outcome. Someplace I have a picture of the Victor with his signature on it.

At the time we made a effort to stop the Press (and others on the Airshow staff) from getting access to the aircraft and taking pictures as we did not want that kind of publicity for the show. A few pictures did get taken by folks who talked their way out onto the field with the Security and Field Maintenance staff. A lot of folks, including me, did get a ride out to have a look, but as a member of the organizing committee I could hardly violate the request!

D.

I was the “Air Boss” of the Hamilton show when the Victor crashed.

It created a major problem for the show as it’s tail impinged on the clearances on the main runway, the only one long enough to take some of the Military jets, which was then closed.

We could not move the aircraft until it had been examined and we had to turf out the Air Attache from Ottawa (Who had been invited to attend but was involved something else.) and he flew in and convened a Court of Inquiry. The CoI group flew in via a VC-10, which we hoped would stay for static display at the show, no such luck!

The bottom line was the aircraft was moved enough to allow the runway to re-open and the diverted aircraft were gathered in from the surrounding airfields. Fortunately the Victor had planned to come in early.

The Victor had flown in from Marham direct and we had requested that they bring a barrel of British beer to sell at the show. The Fire crew said when they got to the aircraft they were amazed to see the crew was pushing out a barrel of beer! Unfortunately the fire crew took the rescued flight crew to their building and somehow the beer never made it to the show!

What happened? According to the story we got from the crew,(before they had time to think a better one up) they had an electrical problem when between Quebec and Montreal and they had to cancel their IFR flight plan, so they descended to below the IFR level (9,500ft?) and flew VFR to Hamilton. This of course significantly increased the fuel consumption!

Unfortunately Hamilton is susceptible to local fogs as the warm moist air from the Lake Ontario drifts in and is pushed up over the airport where it condenses to form a local fog. We got the word from Toronto Control that the Victor was coming in and was going to attempt an approach without it’s approach aids!! The first approach was missed and we got word from the Hamilton tower that they only had sufficient fuel for one more approach and after that they were going to fly over Lake Ontario and eject!

They broke out of the crud to find they were significantly off the runway heading and they tried a quick correction, but they just did not have time to correct and they ran off the runway into a gully, driving the undercarriage oleos up through the wings.

It was our understanding that the aircraft was one of the newer Victors and it had recently had it’s life extended.

We were told the Captain was let go from the Air Force mainly for lack of judgement in that he could have landed safely at Montreal, Trenton or Toronto. The aircraft was scrapped and the nose section was donated to the Canadian Warplane Heritage Museum. I believe they eventually disposed of it as it did not fit into their collection mandate.

It was a long time ago, I hope this fills in some gaps.

Deryck

Hi Deryck,
Thanks for the story from the other side, it is indeed interesting to read.
As we were lead to believe at the time there were a fair number of contributary factors that lead to the crash. I had heard of the electrical problem, which was not uncommon at the time, there was also mention of the IFF equipment being incorrectly tuned for the flight.
Of course the desire to land at the correct airfield was also paramount.
As to the Captain being let go, I actually spoke with him in mid 1986 which was a fair while after the event and he was still active (although under a cloud).
Calling 191 a newer aircraft is abit on the positive side. A less old airframe would have been a better description, and it had indeed had a recent wing strengthening modification.

An interesting story.

Victor XL 191

I was the “Air Boss” of the Hamilton show when the Victor crashed.

It created a major problem for the show as it’s tail impinged on the clearances on the main runway, the only one long enough to take some of the Military jets, which was then closed.

We could not move the aircraft until it had been examined and we had to turf out the Air Attache from Ottawa (Who had been invited to attend but was involved something else.) and he flew in and convened a Court of Inquiry. The CoI group flew in via a VC-10, which we hoped would stay for static display at the show, no such luck!

The bottom line was the aircraft was moved enough to allow the runway to re-open and the diverted aircraft were gathered in from the surrounding airfields. Fortunately the Victor had planned to come in early.

The Victor had flown in from Marham direct and we had requested that they bring a barrel of British beer to sell at the show. The Fire crew said when they got to the aircraft they were amazed to see the crew was pushing out a barrel of beer! Unfortunately the fire crew took the rescued flight crew to their building and somehow the beer never made it to the show!

What happened? According to the story we got from the crew,(before they had time to think a better one up) they had an electrical problem when between Quebec and Montreal and they had to cancel their IFR flight plan, so they descended to below the IFR level (9,500ft?) and flew VFR to Hamilton. This of course significantly increased the fuel consumption!

Unfortunately Hamilton is susceptible to local fogs as the warm moist air from the Lake Ontario drifts in and is pushed up over the airport where it condenses to form a local fog. We got the word from Toronto Control that the Victor was coming in and was going to attempt an approach without it’s approach aids!! The first approach was missed and we got word from the Hamilton tower that they only had sufficient fuel for one more approach and after that they were going to fly over Lake Ontario and eject!

They broke out of the crud to find they were significantly off the runway heading and they tried a quick correction, but they just did not have time to correct and they ran off the runway into a gully, driving the undercarriage oleos up through the wings.

It was our understanding that the aircraft was one of the newer Victors and it had recently had it’s life extended.

We were told the Captain was let go from the Air Force mainly for lack of judgement in that he could have landed safely at Montreal, Trenton or Toronto. The aircraft was scrapped and the nose section was donated to the Canadian Warplane Heritage Museum. I believe they eventually disposed of it as it did not fit into their collection mandate.

It was a long time ago, I hope this fills in some gaps.

Deryck

painting

Thanks Steve! looking forward to seeing that!

I can’t really see what they can do to improve the a/c. It has already been gutted for spares recovery although it does have less FI than the other survivers. Might be a good project in a couple of years time. Victor to the skies?

That would be nice. I’d love to see one gracing our skies again.

Peter et al–

“Victor to the skies”…ah to dream. Never saw one fly. Certainly heard one, XL191 thundering over Hamilton in the absolute duff, a couple minutes from the end of her flying career, but couldn’t see a thing…

I’d posted earlier to ask about landing lights on a Victor and swiftly got the needed response–thanx gents; have now done the intended painting of old 191 coming at you through a curtain of rain, will post an image of it somewhere in due course. Peter–you’d asked specifically about the painting; once I have a digital image of it I’ll email it your way for interest’s sake…

Cheers

S.

That would be nice to see, I’ll keep an eye out for that.

Peter et al–

“Victor to the skies”…ah to dream. Never saw one fly. Certainly heard one, XL191 thundering over Hamilton in the absolute duff, a couple minutes from the end of her flying career, but couldn’t see a thing…

I’d posted earlier to ask about landing lights on a Victor and swiftly got the needed response–thanx gents; have now done the intended painting of old 191 coming at you through a curtain of rain, will post an image of it somewhere in due course. Peter–you’d asked specifically about the painting; once I have a digital image of it I’ll email it your way for interest’s sake…

Cheers

S.

I wish they would take better care of her

Some of the dirt might be due to the fact that I took the Photo with a camera phone, 1.3 mp resolution is never going to deliver great photos. But she is in dire need of a repaint or even a clean. I’m sure the H&S idiots would not be happy about people climbing on the wings to scrub off all the green gunk though. Ruin all our fun they do, we’ll not be allowed to make MEK cannons next……………..:diablo:

I wish they would take better care of her

I can’t really see what they can do to improve the a/c. It has already been gutted for spares recovery although it does have less FI than the other survivers. Might be a good project in a couple of years time. Victor to the skies?

looking a bit grubby

I wish they would take better care of her

XH673

XH673 is at Marham as a gate guard isn’t she??? :confused:

Yep, she was as of 2am last night when i drove off camp!!

obviously i didn’t take this photo then though!