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Reno Accident

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This was sent to me in an email...................

The Reno Air Races has been a premier event among aviators for many years and will most likely permanently end as a result of the tragic accident this weekend at Reno.

The aircraft that crashed was called the Galloping Ghost, and was piloted by Jimmie Leeward, a well-established flier who has raced in this event before.

My brother-in-law, owns a P-51, restores P-51 aircraft for others, and has competed in previous Reno events as well. He was to be flying in this same heat, but because of some engine oil leakage problems was in his pit repairing the aircraft, and thus became an eyewitness to the accident. His pit was located about 100 yards from the point of impact on the tarmac. The aircraft impact on the tarmac(thick reinforced concrete) created a 3-ft by 8-ft hole.

As an eyewitness he observed the a/c to instantaneously pitch up from straight and level flight to cause the accident. The violent pitch up was believed to be initiated by the failure of a horizontal trim tab on the a/c elevator assembly.

The trim tab appears to become detached from one mounting point only, and then to extend itself aft much further than from its normal position in the tail assembly. This would serve to alter the a/c’s trim, and with a force much greater than that when the trim tab is in its correct position, because of a longer than normal lever arm to the a/c’s center of gravity. The a/c at this time was estimated to be traveling about 480 mph. I saw a pix of this broken and trailing trim tab on the web yesterday.

The pitch up appears to have created at least 9g of force based on the observation that the tail wheel of the P-51 extended at the same time.

In normal operation the tail wheel retracts at the same time the main gear does. A mechanism at the rear of the a/c then locks the tail wheel up in place. The limit for mechanical failure of that mechanism is about 9g, and the tail wheel extended during the pitch up maneuver, suggesting that at least 9g had been applied to the a/c and its pilot.

While no one can be certain of the exact g forces sustained by Leeward at that moment, it is probably safe to say that he became totally incapacitated or perhaps even fatally injured as a result, and had provided no input with regard to any observed aircraft maneuvers after that. Basically the a/c was guided by other aerodynamic forces that those normally supplied by the pilot. Telemetry for the a/c showed no changes in the power settings of 3600 rpm, and 110 inches of manifold pressure after the pitch up. This would clearly indicate that the pilot was incapacitated.

A side note, he (brother in law) suggested that pilot might have been fatally injured as well by the rapid 9+g maneuver as the aorta can separate from the heart under those conditions.

My brother in law lost some other friends as well as they were seated in the VIP area.

It is a sad day for aviation.

Edited by akflyerbob

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