WWII B-17 bomber crash in CT this month

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Posted: Sat Oct 26, 2019 8:18 pm

I have been neglectful in waiting this long to mention the horrific crash of the Collings Foundation's B-17 "Nine-O-Nine" on October 2nd in Hartford, CT. Crying or Very sad

Here's a picture of the plane I took a few years ago:

The plane took off but never gained altitude. The pilot asked to return to the airport but crashed on landing. Seven people were killed and seven others were seriously injured, including one ground worker. The plane was totally destroyed -- all that remains is part of the left wing and the tail.

Aside from the tragic loss of life, it's also a tragic loss of American history. There are only a few flight-worthy B-17s left in the world.

I flew over Silicon Valley in Nine-0-Nine in 2013. It was a wonderful experience. (I've made four other B-17 flights in other airworthy aircraft.)

The plane had an important and amazing history, and the Collings Foundation had made over 3,600 stops with it in their annual tours around the US since the 1980s. They are famous for their fanatic devotion to maintenance and safety so this crash is a stunning surprise. Overall, the few warbirds that take passengers on "Flight Experiences" have a superior safety record to commercial airliners. But this crash is already creating political pressure for the FAA to ground future Flight Experiences. I hope that doesn't come to pass. Seeing a plane in a static display is nothing like experiencing it in real life, whether watching from the ground or (better yet) flying in it.

If you care to chime in to the FAA, there is a form here.

I wouldn't hesitate for a moment to go back up in any of the other remaining WWII aircraft, and in fact I hope to fly in Collings Foundation's B-25 next year. I was supposed to go up this year but had a scheduling conflict. Sad

Posted: Sun Oct 27, 2019 4:13 pm

A few years ago I bought a software defined radio and antennae from Amazon for less than $20. Downloaded some free software and entered the world of ADS-B. I have received position and velocity reports from up to 450 flights at one time out to 400 miles away. My system sends about 1200 reports a second and the cool thing is that I can access world wide information in real time that are combined with other systems. My system also performs multilateral triangulation with 60 other local systems to further define positions of aircraft not transmitting ADS-B signals.

As soon as the crash was reported, I examined the flight track of the doomed B-17. It was at 500 feet when it made a turn back to the airport and the signal was lost. The data appears to be impounded or removed. I have only seen data removed for a certain flight of a private jet that supposedly did not stay overnight in Moscow. Our systems show when it landed and when it took off the next day.

They say the pilot of the B-17 reported a "rough mag" to the tower. I had a flashback to my student pilot days when just as we cleared the fence of an airport the single engine plane started stuttering. Clicking the mag over to only one set of sparkplugs made the entire plane shake. Back to both, stuttering and over to the other bank of spark plugs the engine just about idled. My instructor kicked an rudder turn and returned to the airport just missing houses, the fence and the vertical stabilizers of parked aircraft. It was not until we were stopped that we contacted the tower. All the literature on flying says that returning to the airport is never a good idea. Over the years, I have done it three times. The last two times with the tower's permission.

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