The pilot had selected attitude hold on the auto-pilot of his A-7E so that he could raise the radiation thermal shield that had been lowered to simulate instrument conditions. As he attempted to raise the fiberglass shield following laydown release of the mk-106 at 10,000', his elbow inadvertently hit the end of the 6" long canopy release lever and unseated the canopy.
At about 300kts IAS, the wind immediately took the canopy off and the thermal shield impacted his helmet, knocking him unconscious and apparently striking the upper ejection handle. Ejected from the aircraft, he came to just prior to impacting the ground a few miles north of the target at NAS Fallon NEV. The LTjg pilot was shaken but physically unharmed by his adventure.
Unfortunately, his chase safety observer was so busy attempting to spot the bomb hit for scoring purposes that he lost site of the mishap aircraft and missed the whole thing. In the meantime, the aircraft continued northbound with enough fuel on board to make it into Canada and create and international incident.
The a/c was tracked by Oakland Center until it was lost in the shadow of a mountain around Provo Utah. Everyone "assumed" it crashed on the snow-covered mountain. Local skiers and campers in the area all said they heard the aircraft at tree-top level and knew the crash site had to be near by.
Well, weeks went by, then months and the squadron left on an extended combat deployment to SouthEast Asia aboard the USS Kitty Hawk. Over a year later, after they returned from Vietnam, the Aircraft was finally located. It had not crashed into the mountain after all; rather, it had managed to skirt the back side of the mountian and was not reacquired by the radar operator as it continued in attitude hold on a southeasterly course until it ran out of JP and made a relatively soft gear-up, out-of-fuel landing in a remote area in Utah.
Story courtesy CDR. Russ Pearson USN (Ret),
Squadron Aviation Safety Officer, VA-195 1971
CDR Pearson was involved in an Underwater
Ejection incident in 1969.
Hot Seat on the Hanger deck
One of the most important things a pilot of an aircraft equipped with an
ejection seat must do is safe the ejection seat prior to exiting the aircraft.
All ejection seats have some form of safety device, usually backed up by a safety
pin and flag. On the Martin-Baker seats this is a lever or flap that physically
prevents the handle from moving. If the handle is dislodged even slightly, the
seat is considered 'Hot' and special care must be taken to disarm it.
An A-4 Skyhawk was respotted to the hanger deck before the seat was found to
be hot. The A/C was roped off and personel were warned to stay clear. A team of
Aviation Mechanics (AMEs) was dispatched to render the seat safe. The most experienced
AME cautiously entered the cockpit and began removing the intiators while a pair of
AMEs assisted by handing him tools from either side of the cockpit. What happened next
is unknown, but the seat fired. The AME on the seat was hurtled up into the hanger
deck ceiling denting it and killing him. The rocket blast killed the other
two technicians.
The above stories are courtesy of a former AME from the same ship
Inadvertant Ejection : Mogadishu, Somalia 1990
A young Somali boy was poking around a Somali Air Force hangar shortly after the military had abandoned its base at Mogadishu. Chaos was running rampant in the area, as feuding rebel warlords were fighting for control, starvation was prominent and the UN peacekeeping force had not yet arrived. The curious Somali teenager hopped up into the cockpit of one of the abandoned Mig 15s in the hangar and undoubtably proceeded to fulfill his fantasies as an aspiring fighter pilot. Unfortunately, he encountered more realism than he desired when he pulled the ejection handles and immediately found out that the seat was one item in the dysfunctional aircraft that still worked. He proceeded to get the ride of his life as the seat fired, and a few milliseconds later he was airborne and rapidly heading toward the wild blue yonder. Unfortunately, there was a hangar roof between him and the sky, and he never took the opportunity to strap into the seat as he was playing aspiring fighter pilot. As he approached the hangar roof, his body gradually drifted apart from the seat and achieved sufficient lateral separation to avoid coming to a rapid halt as the seat impacted an overhead 12" steel girder support beam, putting a serious deformation in it. Our flying Somali superboy fared only slightly better, as his body was undoubtably bashed and shredded as it punched a hole through the sheet roof and landed on the tarmac outside the hangar.
EJECTION SEATS SAVE LIVES, BUT WILL ALSO TAKE THE LIFE OF THE UNSUSPECTING
INDIVIDUALS WHO DON'T TAKE THE PROPER PRECAUTIONS PRIOR TO WORKING AROUND THEM.
TREAT ALL EJECTION SEATS AND EGRESS SYSTEMS AS IF THEY ARE ARMED UNLESS YOU ARE
SURE THEY ARE NOT! EVEN A FIRED SEAT MAY HAVE SOME LIVE CARTRIDGES IN THE
EMERGENCY GROUND EGRESS SYSTEM!
Broken Launch Bar Linkage
The USS Forrestal (CV-59) was on its last operational cruise in the Med in 1990. We were conducting night flight ops off the coast of Turkey in support of Operation Provide Comfort. I had just shutdown my aircraft and was walking across the flight deck when the sound of snapping metal amidst a Tomcat launch off the port waist cat caught my attention. I turned to see the F-14 sliding sideways towards the edge of the flight deck. Apparently a component of the launch bar had snapped midway through the catapult stroke sequence, giving the Tomcat only a gentle push (approx. 20-30 knots) instead of the huge kick in the butt required to get the aircraft up to flying speed. The pilot had immediately realized something was wrong, and in a split second reacted to attempt to hit the brakes and stop prior to falling off the edge into the ocean 80 feet below. As they approached the edge, a tire blew sending the F-14 sliding sideways, and the pilot judged they wouldn't stop in time and initiated ejection. As the pilot and RIO rode the seat rails up into the night, one of the F-14s main landing gear jumped the deck edge rail but miraculously stuck just over the edge, and the aircraft remained perched precariously partially over the deck edge. The RIO was soon sighted landing further aft on the flight deck, and although he received some bumps, bruises and scrapes from his ejection and rough landing on the flight deck, he was was happy to walk away from it with a good story to tell that night over midrats. Meanwhile, a full scale search was underway for the pilot. The airborne SAR helicopter had witnessed the ejection and was on the scene so rapidly that the image of the RIO floating down in his parachute canopy nearly filled their windscreen as they whipped across the fantail. They quickly set up for an approach to the datum, and commenced a hover search. Flight operations were suspended and all airborne aircraft were given instructions to hold overhead (or expeditiously recovered if low on fuel). Fifteen minutes later there was still no sign of the pilot. As the search proceeded with additional helicopters and ships in the area, the flight deck began to quiet down. An alert deck hand thought he heard a faint cry for help, but didn't see anything over the deck edge. The sound of yelling for help persisted, and suddenly the deck hand looked up, and with the aid of his flashlight, was able to make out the shape of the pilot hanging from his parachute 100 feet above him in the radio antennaes and masts at the top of the carrier's superstructure. Although the recovery of the pilot took an additional half hour, he was recovered uninjured.
The above two stories are courtesy of a Naval Aviator
YF-14 1st Flight Hydraulic Failure 1970
The YF-14 was returning from a successful maiden flight when on final approach, the pilot's voice suddenly burst out of the radio speakers: "Whoops, flight controls... Eject! Eject!" The canopy blasted off and tumbled aft of the ship. The aft seat fired, followed a split second later by the forward seat. Simultaniously, the plane began its terminal descent. As the chutes blossomed above, the fireball blossomed below. The pilot and RIO were observed descending into the black smoke.
Suddenly, slightly higher and to the side of where they disappeared the chute appeared out of the smoke. Both crewmembers, William Miller (pilot) and Robert K. Smyth, descended to safe landings in the trees with no significant injuries.
The pilot reported and the evidence indicated that the aircraft was suddenly losing all hydraulic pressure and the pilot had made the immediate descision to eject. In the ten to fifteen seconds from the pilot's noticing the pressure drop until the seats cleared the fuselage, the lack of positive control was visible from the chase plane view. The crew's parachutes had descended straight toward the flaming debris, with obvious dire possibilities when the hot air from the flame was caught by the parachute canopies and lifted them in the same manner as a hot air balloon. The 20kt wind was enough to push the chutes 100 yards downwind of the fire.
An odd sidebar to this story is that the wingbox frame
of the F-14 is a giant piece of titanium, and the one from this a/c was
recovered from the debris. It is rumored that it was used in a later aircraft
to save time and money for the flight test program.
S-3 Viking Stuck Wheel
It had been a long night, and now it was getting longer. The Viking was on a night training flight with only the pilot and navigator. While preparing for landing, the nose gear failed to extend. After following all standard NATOPS procedures to no avail, it was decided to try a hard bounce on the main gear to try to knock the nose gear loose. The pilot brought the plane in and struck the deck a little harder than planned, the nose rotated down and struck the deck. With precious airspeed being bled off in a trail of sparks across the deck, the pilot initiated ejection. The flight deck crews watched the night being torn by sparks and rockets for a few brilliant seconds and then the plane was gone off the angle deck. The flight deck crew raced into action to recover the parachuting personel (who also included two extra 'Fritz' crewmembers, weights attatched to the unused ejection seats to give the empty seats the correct trajectory as they fired). "705 to Air Boss" rattled out of the speakers in Pri-Fly. "Stand by 705, we have an emergency!" replied the Air Boss gruffly.
"No sir, you don't understand" the speakers rattled again " I AM your emergency!!" The voice belonged to the pilot of the Viking who had been quite surprised to see all the other seats in the Viking eject without him! As the plane fell off the angle deck he had managed to get the plane under control and headed away from the carrier, but in the confusion of the ejections nobody had noticed the plane hadn't crashed. He later managed to get the plane safely down on the deck.
The above story is courtesy of a fellow Viking pilot
