Posted on 04/16/2010 10:04:01 PM PDT by ErnstStavroBlofeld
Thanks for expanding coverage Pangaea link facinating and offers background info into volcanic dust
- St. Helens erruption plume contained larger particles. The stuff exhausted from iceland is much finer and remains longer in the air.
- Air traffic in 1980 was nothing compared to airtraffic today.
The F-4 taxied out to line up on runway 27 and the crew ran through their checklist. They were patched in to the PA system so we could hear.
The pilot announced he had set his brakes and would run each engine up to full power...one at a time. "If I go to full power on both engines, we'll just skid down the runway."
He then lit burners, released brakes and accelerated until he rotated right in front of the crowd. The ground was shaking. He pulled vertical and was gone. All I could think was "Wow!"
Any jet engine mechanic worth his salt could have told those dumbasses that this would have happened.
It’s happened before with commercial airlines as well.
The problem is the cooling channels in the turbine blades in the High Pressure Turbine just behind the combustion chamber. If those get blocked, the blades will overheat and eventually fail, causing any number of catastrophic failures, the most common would be the blades coming apart and destroying the engine.
Some engines also have cooling holes in the combustion chamber liners. If those get blocked, you may have a burn through, into the boundary air layer.
Pilot recounts day of heroism on Mount St. Helens
"Commercial air traffic throughout the area ground to a halt because of the reduced visibility and potential hazard of flying through ash clouds rising 80,000 feet into the sky."
Saw a flight of F-4 flyin in Egypt a few years back. Heard them and my heart skipped a beat, then saw them. Brought back a lot of good memories. Good to see the old girl still flying and doing the job.
Boundary air control makes that moaning sound. Almost wonder if McDonnell could have called it Banshee II.
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