Scratch one Sea Fury

[DaveG]

RNHF Sea Fury crash landing at Culdrose Air Day. Pilot thankfully OK.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-cornwall-28594569

[DaveB]

Deary do The first picture doesn't look so bad.. more like the RH gear has collapsed but the ones below show rather more damage. That said.. it's probably mendable and as you say, the pilot escaped ok which is the important thing

ATB
DaveB

[TSR2]

Oh dear. Glad everyone is ok. Hopefully it will repair ok.

[Steve M]

Attended Culdrose with friends today and for the first time in years the sun shone. We were just leaving as the Sea Fury took off. WE stayed in the car park on base to see the display and towards the end of it the fury pulled up and there was a loud pop from the engine followed by white smoke from the cowling. He managed to complete a short circuit back to the runway losing a lot of height. On finals he had flaps down but only the inner gear doors. We thought he was going down into the grass area before the threshold but he made the end of the rwy. It looked as though only the port gear was down as he dropped in and that collapsed as soon as the aircraft made ground.
Awful to see and our hearts were in our mouths as the incident unfolded but pleased the pilot got out and walked away.

Steve M

[DaveB]

Thanks for that Steve

ATB
DaveB

[SkippyBing]

Good to see the pilot's okay. I'm no expert but it doesn't look unrepairable, certainly they've taken much worse wrecks and made them flyable!

[Dev One]

The pilot made a very good job of getting it down - good for him. Engines though must be getting scarce as well as the people to repair & maintain them.
Seems that either the junk head has given up as Hercs & Centurii are prone to do, & pistons can also snatch the cylinder if getting overcool suddenly. (Learnt that from my father who was an unlimited X licence holder back in the 70's & looked after G-BCOV.)
Keith

P.S. Video of it over at SOH. Seems he left the gear up until the last minute, both dropped but neither locked down as both wheels touched down, but then the RH one collapsed first, followed by the other - must have been an underwear change moment!

[Hot_Charlie]

No luck for the RNHF at all, an this was the T20 that was loaned/gifted/donated by Tim Manna several whilst the struggles with the FB11 continued. The unit has absolutely horrendous luck. In 25 years it's lost 2 Sea Furies (ok, one has been resurrected via the USA and now resides back in the UK), the Firefly, had various issues with the Sea Hawk over three decades, and the Fishes too.

Great outcome yesterday though. Apparently had the gear down, brought it up again, then dropped again it over the threshold. Probably a blessing both legs collapsed mind you,