I Have always thought there should be a memorial somewhere for all pilots we have lost and maybe if Duxford won’t host such a thing the next best thing is a web site where we can post maybe a photo of the lost crew and Aircraft and leave a message of condonance or something.

The webmaster of the WIX website asked the WIX community if they would like this done. The majority said no, and the main reason is that any type of online memorial could be used against the warbird community by the news media, insurance companies, governments and other entitities. It’s a fantastic, nice idea, but when reality of what it could do to the warbird movement intrudes, then you see that it is not a good idea at all. It’s really a shame, it would be great to honor all these pilots, but in the end such a list would be used against all of us, pilots, enthusiasts, etc… A sad sad evil world we live in.

John

I have a dedicated photo album, whenever an airplane is lost, I put it’s picture in there. It’s not even close to the true amount of airplanes I’ve either been on or seen that are gone and not all I’ve photographed do I have reg numbers for. I counted it a few years ago and the number was almost 40 airplanes. I really don’t sit around here counting anymore it’s too depressing, and I don’t think I can count that high. It’s a tribute photo album, and it’s done for the memories, like this thread, not for any morbid or sick reason. I actually haven’t looked at it in awhile, but it needs to be updated with the crash of the Bushmaster 2000 last week (the Ford Trimotor replica in Calif.)

John

Here’s more of Ellsworth Getchell’s Sea Fury at Shafter in May 2004.

John

Great they are on holiday during the busy summer/tourist season. Shut the museum down when the most visitors will be coming. Makes alot of sense. 🙁

John

The Yanks airplane keeps showing up on lists, but as far as I know it’s never been flown. I don’t even think they’ve ever ran it up. The Yanks airplanes are restored to airworthy standards, but it seems they never even run them up! It’s an exact replica of the Champlin Museum’s operating procedures. Restored to airworthy standards but never flown. Which leads to this, if they’re restored to airworthy status, but never run up or flown, then they probably shouldn’t be on flying lists like this right?

John

No female was killed that I know of doing a ribbon cut. I think you are all thinking of Joanne Osterud’s accident in Arizona at Yuma in 1997 in the twilight, she did do ribbon cuts and was doing one when she hit the ground because of the low visibility. The plane was pretty much a write off and she was ok. Her career was finished though, she has yet to return to airshow flying, but probably still is an airline pilot.

JH

Kermit’s Fertile Mertile was flying with it’s previous owners out of Northern California in the late 1970’s. Kermit tried to get it flying and nearly crashed it into downtown Oakland on a test or ferry flight around 1984 (because of mechanical problems).

John