Posted on 03/22/2011 4:27:12 AM PDT by kristinn
USS MOUNT WHITNEY, Mediterranean Sea, Mar 22, 2011 — Two crew members ejected from their U.S. Air Force F-15E Strike Eagle when the aircraft experienced equipment malfunction over northeast Libya, March 21, 2011 at approximately 10:30 p.m. CET.
Both crew members ejected and are safe.
The aircraft, based out of Royal Air Force Lakenheath, England, was flying out of Aviano Air Base in support of Operation Odyssey Dawn at the time of the incident.
The cause of the incident is under investigation.
The identities will be released after the next of kin have been notified.
Joint Task Force Odyssey Dawn is the U.S. Africa Command task force established to provide operational and tactical command and control of U.S. military forces supporting the international response to the unrest in Libya and enforcement of United Nations Security Council Resolution (UNSCR) 1973. UNSCR 1973 authorizes all necessary measures to protect civilians in Libya under threat of attack by Qadhafi regime forces.
That missile will be going to the highest bidder.
“F-15E Strike Eagle cost = $32 million in 1998, in 2011 close to $100 million to replace.”
Inflationary.
“Simple. Engine suddenly stops working. Pilot pulls jet into vertical assent and then ejects when it stalls. Jet then falls vertically to the ground.”
Not so simple. I’ve never heard of a pilot responding to an engine failure by pulling the nose up, stalling, and then ejecting. And this failure would have needed to kill two engines, which would be catastrophic.
http://www.foxnewsinsider.com/2011/03/22/video-u-s-warplane-down-in-libya/
The plane is reported to have suffered a mechanical problem. Both pilots ejected from the F-15E Eagle jet safely.
Video
You sure as heck don't want to eject when your forward velocity is 700 miles per hour. No, you slow the jet down, if possible, and then eject. If you are 100 feet off the ground trying to hit a ground target and going 700 miles per hour and you suddenly lose all engine power, are you going to eject then or are you going to pull that plane straight up until you are as high as possible before pulling the ejection lever?
“...Incident in Libya;crew safe,
A plane crash is an “incident”. Hmmmm....strange choice of words. “
Sounds like a European description. A car accident is a “shunt”.
i thought it kinda looked ‘parked’ then thermited...
We’ve already flown the wings off the C models and are working down the E models.
I spent time at neighboring Mildenhall in the 1980s, when the U-2 and SR-71 were flying there. Great area, great missions, lots of fun.
IIRC in the 1986 attack on Libya the only aircraft loss ( F-111 ) we had went down due to the same thing.
Waste of money and another stupid war. What is going on in the uSA is just like Rome. Watch the film Gladiator. Corrupt govt and leader has the army off on 3 chicken sh*t wars to get the country’s best killed. Distract the masses with bread and circuses (food stamps & crap & propaganda TV).
Bankrupt the nation. Our military is getting wiped out protecting the House of Saud. A nation of fools drooling over propaganda TV and media. Sad.
Well, considering the F-15 has two engines, this is a bit less likely - unless a catastrophic blade failure took out the other engine as well. Would have to be something affecting both at once somehow, a flock of birds (I doubt they were that low) or some sort of fuel contamination.
Wut?
I noticed on Fox news footage showing both aim 9 and 120 missiles on the ground.
I’ve got over 2000 hours in F-4s and F-111s. I understand about high speed ejections. However, if you can control the jet’s vector and have that 700 kts of energy, keep flying, at least until you slow down. If you cannot control the jet’s vector, then eject with whatever you have when the ground is getting too close.
“you suddenly lose all engine power, are you going to eject then or are you going to pull that plane straight up until you are as high as possible before pulling the ejection lever?”
I would keep flying, trading airspeed for altitude and try to correct the problem. If that is not an option, and the ground was getting close, I’d eject. But I would NOT pull the nose vertical and eject...
Then, in the absence of the plane going into a flat spin, how do you explain a flat belly down crash landing with no evidence of forward motion.
5:05pm
Western warplanes attacked a military aircraft belonging to Muammar Gaddafi’s armed forces that was flying towards the rebel-held city of Benghazi.
http://blogs.aljazeera.net/live/africa/live-blog-libya-march-22#update-18481
What if you were in a vertical trajectory when the engines suddenly quit?
This is mostly due to politics and Pentegon budgetary planning. Reason: piecemeal buying practices and no economy of scale.
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