Harrier missed approach

[machineman9]

Any idea what actually happened? It looked like a bad case of 'oh so that is where the ground is' just before meeting with it. Late to pull up, perhaps late to eject, definately late for dinner.

What happened is the wrong manoeuvre in the wrong country. Sounds daft I know, but let me explain. The Harrier is very marginal on thrust when not in conventional flight. The pilot was performing a very short landing. The video looks like Afghanistan from the amount of Rubs (rubber hangers in the background). So add marginal engine performance to high air temperatures and, well you get this. In a previous life that involved a light blue suit I spent quite a lot of time in a hot sunny country with the Harrier Force for Op Warden. The Harrier could only fly early in the morning or evening due to air temperature conditions and was limited to conventional take off and landing. The moment that this pilot decided to perform this landing, he placed his order for his Martin Baker tankard and tie. Also he was unlucky on two other fronts. Firstly it was all captured in glorious technicolour and the Harrier is one of the few fighters that has an accident data recorder . So a nice print out of his accident at 0,1 second intervals too.

Matt

Yeah it looked to me as if the pilot was hoping for more to happen than what actually did - Understeer, if you will. Anyone capable of flying something that large is bound to know how to land it properly and for what ever reason it seems like what they were used to doing to land it just didn't work that time. It would be like a Californian trying to park their car on Alaska's slippiest iciest road; they're not quite prepared for what to expect even though they're qualified and may have been driving for decades.

[Al_Fallujah]

Any idea what actually happened? It looked like a bad case of 'oh so that is where the ground is' just before meeting with it. Late to pull up, perhaps late to eject, definately late for dinner.

What happened is the wrong manoeuvre in the wrong country. Sounds daft I know, but let me explain. The Harrier is very marginal on thrust when not in conventional flight. The pilot was performing a very short landing. The video looks like Afghanistan from the amount of Rubs (rubber hangers in the background). So add marginal engine performance to high air temperatures and, well you get this. In a previous life that involved a light blue suit I spent quite a lot of time in a hot sunny country with the Harrier Force for Op Warden. The Harrier could only fly early in the morning or evening due to air temperature conditions and was limited to conventional take off and landing. The moment that this pilot decided to perform this landing, he placed his order for his Martin Baker tankard and tie. Also he was unlucky on two other fronts. Firstly it was all captured in glorious technicolour and the Harrier is one of the few fighters that has an accident data recorder . So a nice print out of his accident at 0,1 second intervals too.

Matt

Yeah it looked to me as if the pilot was hoping for more to happen than what actually did - Understeer, if you will. Anyone capable of flying something that large is bound to know how to land it properly and for what ever reason it seems like what they were used to doing to land it just didn't work that time. It would be like a Californian trying to park their car on Alaska's slippiest iciest road; they're not quite prepared for what to expect even though they're qualified and may have been driving for decades.

I saw one news article that indicated it may have been an emergency approach. But only one articel said that, no others, so I cannot confirm it, nor verify the cause of the emergency.

I think I did see that it happened around 1030, which would be pretty warm by that time in the desert.

[expat]

Any idea what actually happened? It looked like a bad case of 'oh so that is where the ground is' just before meeting with it. Late to pull up, perhaps late to eject, definately late for dinner.

What happened is the wrong manoeuvre in the wrong country. Sounds daft I know, but let me explain. The Harrier is very marginal on thrust when not in conventional flight. The pilot was performing a very short landing. The video looks like Afghanistan from the amount of Rubs (rubber hangers in the background). So add marginal engine performance to high air temperatures and, well you get this. In a previous life that involved a light blue suit I spent quite a lot of time in a hot sunny country with the Harrier Force for Op Warden. The Harrier could only fly early in the morning or evening due to air temperature conditions and was limited to conventional take off and landing. The moment that this pilot decided to perform this landing, he placed his order for his Martin Baker tankard and tie. Also he was unlucky on two other fronts. Firstly it was all captured in glorious technicolour and the Harrier is one of the few fighters that has an accident data recorder . So a nice print out of his accident at 0,1 second intervals too.

Matt

Yeah it looked to me as if the pilot was hoping for more to happen than what actually did - Understeer, if you will. Anyone capable of flying something that large is bound to know how to land it properly and for what ever reason it seems like what they were used to doing to land it just didn't work that time. It would be like a Californian trying to park their car on Alaska's slippiest iciest road; they're not quite prepared for what to expect even though they're qualified and may have been driving for decades.

I saw one news article that indicated it may have been an emergency approach. But only one articel said that, no others, so I cannot confirm it, nor verify the cause of the emergency.

I think I did see that it happened around 1030, which would be pretty warm by that time in the desert.

I would discount the emergency approach theory purely due to the aircraft being in a very tight place when doing that sort of manoeuvre with marginal engine performance due to temperature. A normal emergency harrier approach will be fixed throttle and nozzles at 55 degrees and a normal approach. Saying that, as we only have a video and sketchy reports it is hard to say, however I would suspect that the pilot had an interview without coffee and biscuits.

Here are a couple of reports I found. They mention an emergency landing, but I think that is more propaganda than anything else.

Flightglobal

Due to gear not extending, funny but the video tells another picture and if so, why a risky STOL manoeuvre

[url=http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/afghanistan/5322750/Pilot-ejects-from-RAF-Harrier-crash.html]Another gear story and luckily the Harrier was not carrying passengers

[The Ruptured Duck]

I imagine he was thinking what many student pilots think when they carry too much airspeed over the runway and balloon:  "I can save it, I can save it."  Of course then he saw the airplane was on fire and ejected

[Al_Fallujah]

[quote]
[url=http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/afghanistan/5322750/Pilot-ejects-from-RAF-Harrier-crash.html]Another gear story and luckily the Harrier was not carrying passengers