Posted on 05/15/2024 6:01:29 AM PDT by Red Badger
An Air Force instructor pilot died early in the morning on May 14 from injuries sustained when the pilot’s T-6A Texan II training plane ejection seat activated during ground operations the day before, the 82nd Training Wing at Sheppard Air Force Base, Texas, announced in a press release.
“An investigation into the cause of the incident is underway,” the wing wrote, adding that the pilot’s name is being withheld for 24 hours to notify his or her next of kin.
The 82nd is the host unit at Sheppard, but the pilot was assigned to the 80th Flying Training Wing, the unit which runs the Euro-NATO Joint Jet Pilot Training (ENJJPT) Program, a multinational school where students and instructors from across NATO learn and teach the basics of flying.
The wing flies the T-6, a two-seat propeller plane often used for basic aviation lessons in undergraduate pilot training, and the T-38, a two-seat jet typically used to teach future fighter and bomber pilots. Two years ago, 76 T-6s and 203 T-38s were grounded due to concerns about potentially faulty ejection seat parts. The grounding affected 40 percent of the T-38 fleet and 15 percent of the T-6 fleet.
At the time, Air Force Materiel Command said the explosive cartridges used in the ejection seats may suffer from “quality defects.” Each seat has multiple and redundant explosive cartridges. Two months after the stand-down, the Air Force had found no faulty cartridges on any of the T-6s, Breaking Defense reported at the time.
“Our primary concern is the safety of our Airmen and it is imperative that they have confidence in our equipment,” Maj. Gen. Craig Wills, then-head of the 19th Air Force, said at the time.
The average age of the T-6 fleet is 17 years old, according to 2023 data. While spry compared to the T-38’s average age of about 56 years, senior Air Force leaders say the age of trainer aircraft is slowing down pilot production.
“From the time they [student pilots] are commissioned—because of the challenges we’re having with T-6 and T-38—we have a little bit of a backup. It can be as many as four years,” then-Vice Chief of Staff Gen. David W. Allvin told the House Armed Services Committee in 2023. “So almost an 18 month- to 24 month-wait just to get into pilot training.”
A T-6 made an emergency “belly flop” landing at Joint Base San Antonio-Randolph, Texas, on April 3 after its pilot declared an in-flight emergency. No one was injured in the incident.
This is a developing story and will be updated as more details become available.
Thanks for service and for imparting great first hand knowledge. Very educational mate!
Goodness! Gracious! In a great ball of fire?
WOW !!! Thank You for the detailed explanation and also for Your Service.
I’m pretty sure if I had a 105/155 charge aimed point blank at My A$$ I would be so tensed up that I might injure My Spine from that Charge being there without actually having it go off !!!🤪
So a K-Bar cut through the Canopy ? I thought that Canopies were bullet resistant. But that’s what I get for thinking...
Skydancer- I’m guessing that You got Pinged by rlmorel and I can’t see it but just incase...
Do tell, please.
Song goes back to WWII ...
On the ejection seat back which goes higher than the pilot sitting on it goes higher than the pilot’s head and is designed to crash through the canopy.
There was another vulture that was hit by the ram-air cooling scoop, and its guts got sucked into the radome. I didn’t see that one. I heard it smelled really bad.
I figured it out after the fact-the reason the pilot could cut through the canopy from the inside was the same reason you could have banged on the outside of that canopy with a large hammer and it might not break-the canopy is essentially an arch-structure.
Think of the human skull. It can take a fearsome blow from the outside and do a respectable job of protecting the fragile brain within (VERY intelligent design) but if you were inside that skull, it would not take much effort to break open that same skull from the inside going out.
Same thing.
People on Free Republic do that for me all the time. I have learned so much here, often about things I had no idea about.
Don’t know much about archeology...someone like SunkenCiv fills me in. Don’t know much about civilian aviation? We have airline pilots here. Don’t know much about infantry tactics? We have plenty of people here who can enlighten you with first-hand experience!
Medicine? Computers? Art? Ditto!
We used to have a Freeper, can’t remember his handle, but he knew the energy industry inside out and upside down. Anytime I wanted to know about a specific thing, I could ping him and even if he didn’t know specifically about something, he knew of it tangentially.
I happen to have had flight deck experience for several years, and I learned a lot about it, enough to be able to watch video and tell you exactly what people are doing in it.
We have a Freeper (Gundog) who when I asked about F-4 Phantoms, he OBVIOUSLY had experience with them, having taken the fins of those Sparrow missiles in the back or head while during under the plane during operations!
The ring of truth, FRiends...this forum often has it if you look for it!
(LOL...this is apparently the one without the really raunchy sex-infused lyrics!)
Blood On the Risers(Gory Gory What a Helluva Way to Die) lyrics. (Sung to the tune of “The Battle Hymn of The Republic)
He was just a rookie trooper and he surely shook with fright.
He checked off his equipment and made sure his pack was tight.
He had to sit and listen to those awful engines roar.
You ain’t gonna jump no more.
Chorus:
Gory, gory, what a hell of way to die.
Gory, gory, what a hell of way to die.
Gory, gory, what a hell of way to die.
He ain’t gonna jump no more.
“Is everybody happy?” cried the sergeant looking up.
Our hero feebly answered, “Yes”, and then they stood him up.
He jumped into the icy blast, his static line unhooked.
And he ain’t gonna jump no more.
Chorus:
He counted long, he counted loud, he waited for the shock.
He felt the wind, he felt the cold, he felt the awful drop.
The silk from his reserve spilled out and wrapped around his legs.
And he ain’t gonna jump no more.
Chorus:
The risers swung around his neck, connectors cracked his dome.
Suspension lines were tied in knots around his skinny bones.
The canopy became his shroud, he hurtled to the ground.
And he ain’t gonna jump no more.
Chorus:
The days he lived and loved and laughed kept running through his mind.
He thought about the girl back home, the one he left behind.
He thought about the medicos and wondered what they’d find.
And he ain’t gonna jump no more.
Chorus:
The ambulance was on the spot, the jeeps were running wild.
The medics jumped and screamed with glee, rolled up their sleeves and smiled.
For it had been a week or more since last a ‘chute had failed.
And he ain’t gonna jump no more.
Chorus:
He hit the ground, the sound was “Splat,” his blood went spurting high.
His comrades they were heard to say, “A helluva way to die.”
He lay there rolling ‘round in the welter of his gore.
And he ain’t gonna jump no more.
Chorus:
There was blood upon the risers, there were brains upon the ‘chute.
Intestines were a-dangling from his paratrooper suit.
He was a mess, they picked him up and poured him from his boots.
And he ain’t gonna jump no more.
The B-52 still has two seats that eject downward. The penalty for having navigator wings.
The T-6A has shaped charges that fracture the canopy as part of the ejection sequence. By design the ejection process in that plane does not blow the canopy first. The crew ejects through the hole left by the shaped charges.
You hit on the beauty of this forum that there are people here from all walks of life and life time experience, knowledge, and wisdom. So much to learn. Good for us!😀
I sure am grateful for it...:)
https://martin-baker.com/tie-club/
That’s fun. But I still wouldn’t want to try it. God Bless the guys who’ve had to do it :-)
That's why the Air Force drills it into our heads not to put screw drivers or wrenches in our back pockets.
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