Posted on 11/28/2007 4:27:09 PM PST by Excuse_My_Bellicosity
November 27, 2007 (by Asif Shamim) - Air Force Times is reporting that an accident investigation board has concluded its investigation and released a report on Monday saying that F-16C (#91-0386) crashed due to a jammed throttle cable during a night training mission over the Nevada test range.
The pilot, Maj. David Epperson declared an in-flight emergency 46 minutes into his mission when he discovered the engine throttle was stuck at max settings for the engine. With the jet stuck with afterburners on, he realised he would be unable to make a landing at the Tonopah Test Range Airfield on March 12th.
On declaring the emergency a decision was made to let the F-16 from 16th Weapons Squadron run out of fuel. This took approximately 8 minutes for the tanks to run dry. The Major’s plan was then to glide the jet into land at Tonopah.
The problem was then further compounded when the airfield automated lights failed to activate when Epperson and his Flight leader radioed in the emergency.
The lights finally came on as the Major was on approach to the airfield. Realising he would not reach the runway and only 50 feet above the desert he decided to eject. Less than 2 seconds later the F-16 crashed 1,500 feet short of the runway skidding 1,000 feet before stopping.
The accident board determined that the cable which was first installed back in 1991 had passed recent inspections. Investigators could not be certain when or how the cable became damaged.
At the time of the incident, Epperson an experienced pilot was assigned as an instructor pilot with the Weapons School based at Nellis Air Force Base. He was also the also the chief of safety for the school.
“...the airfield was higher elevation, and someone forgot to callibrate the altimeter.”
The Devil IS in the details.
Fortunately Death didn’t come along for that ride.
As I read it, he had already run out of fuel and was attempting to glide it in to a landing. He came up short of the runway and had to punch out.
"Afterburners" implies multi-engine,the F-16 is a single engine aircraft.
OK,OK,so I'm a nitpicker but that's my job!
“After years of operations at Tonopah, the F-117 was redeployed to Holloman AFB (New Mexico) in May/July 1992, where it is part of the 49th Fighter Wing. In January 1990, Secretary of Defense Dick Cheney proposed that the stealth fighters be relocated from Tonopah, to Holloman Air Force Base in New Mexico’s Tularosa Basin.”
Item #2, it’s an UNMANNED airfield, as in, nobody home after dark.
Item #3 FAA data (if you want to Google earth the site)
FAA INFORMATION EFFECTIVE 25 OCTOBER 2007
Location
FAA Identifier: TNX
Lat/Long: 37-47-40.7750N / 116-46-43.2290W
37-47.679583N / 116-46.720483W
37.7946597 / -116.7786747
(estimated)
Elevation: 5549 ft. / 1691 m (estimated)
Variation: 15E (1980)
From city: 27 miles SE of TONOPAH, NV
Time zone: UTC -7 (UTC -8 during Standard Time)
Zip code: 89013
Airport Operations
Airport use: Private use. Permission required prior to landing
Activation date: 07/1969
Sectional chart: LAS VEGAS
Control tower: no
ARTCC: LOS ANGELES CENTER
FSS: RENO FLIGHT SERVICE STATION
Attendance: CONTINUOUS
Wind indicator: yes
Segmented circle: yes
Lights: RY LGTS OPER BY CALLING SILVERBOW TOWER 134.1 OR 297.65.
Nearby radio navigation aids
VOR radial/distance VOR name Freq Var
TPHr123/18.6 TONOPAH VORTAC 117.20 17E
Airport Services
Airframe service: NONE
Powerplant service: NONE
Runway Information
Runway 14/32
Dimensions: 12000 x 150 ft. / 3658 x 46 m
Surface: concrete
Runway edge lights: high intensity
RUNWAY 14 RUNWAY 32
Traffic pattern: left left
Airport Ownership and Management from official FAA records
Ownership: U.S. Air Force
Owner: US AIR FORCE
HQ AIR COMBAT COMMAND
LANGLEY AFB, VA 23665
Phone 804-764-3120
Manager: VERNON GABBARD JR
SANDIA LAB PO BOX 871
TONOPAH, NV 89049
Phone 702-295-8313
Normally you click your mike a couple of times on a certain frequency to activate the strip lights for a few mins. I can’t imagine the size of or the density of brass the pilot had for nads to attempt a engine out/dead stick landing, at night, on an unmanned airfield in an F-16 - the worlds largest Lawn Dart.
Sounds like the kind of system that's been used for years at small town airports. Key the mic on the designated frequency, and the lights should automatically come on.
If so, it could be anything from a simple 'wrong frequency' at either end to a significant software failure, to human error in setting up the system.
That somebody would be the pilot in command.
Too bad they didn’t get their money’s worth in the person assigned to turn on the runway lights.
***************************************
This field had automated lighting installed ,,, typically you transmit on a special frequency to turn on the lights... didn’t work this time,, usually you would transmit directly above the airport (otherwise spurious signals from a great distance would turn on the lights constantly) and enter the pattern... I don’t know how well a F-16 glides but he didn’t have much time to accomplish this task and get circled around for a landing..
Now, if you're rotated upside down, then it's one of the quickest forms of suicide there is. Or if you're the Nav in a something like a B-47 Stratojet, then you'd better have a little altitude.
Ah - ok - thanks.
Oh don't be silly, it's an air plane. He should have used the air brakes.
"Fly by wire" refers to the flight controls.
“These jets are fly by wire, so this must have been well downstream from the cockpit controls, or the headline is wrong.”
— —
Not so.
The F-16 design goes back to before 1975. The cable is not connected to any EEC. It is connected to the MFC, or MEC depending on the model.
I know this because in 1984 I was a prime designer of the test operator’s engine interface station on the F16 engine test stand for the military.
Cables are awful. They work fine when laid out in a straight line, but they accumulate error, backlash (hysteresis) as they are bent and contorted to fit in the plane. The wired engines of today are just excellent.
I think they usually do.
What about the guy in the YouTube clip upthread? Apparently that crash was his fault.
Not quite an option in a fighter jet. However what he did do was almost the same thing. He could have killed the engine, I'm pretty sure there is a fuel cutoff switch, but gliding in with empty tanks beats gliding in with a belly full of jet fuel. It also allows you to get into the best position for that glide in to landing.
It sounds as if the lights were pilot controlled runway/approach lights. The pilot sets a certain frequency into his radio and keys his mike a set number of times in 5 seconds. The number of times he keys the mike increases the intensity of the lighting. There is no one on the ground to turn the lights on or off. These type of airfield lighting is common at uncontrolled airfields.
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