Half Finnish, half Canadian F-18 Hornet crashes in Finland

[Finn47]

They (Patria Aviation, Finland) spent a few years of calendar time, some 15 million euros and a hundred thousand manhours to build a twin seat Hornet D from two half frames, one Finnish and one Canadian - but now it´s gone, having crashed today on a test flight where the two pilots had to eject because the aircraft entered a tail slide and a steep dive and flight controls stopped working for some reason. The pilots are OK, though, after minor surgery.

A Finnish Air Force F/A-18 crashed in Juupajoki in Finland's Pirkanmaa province on Thursday, the emergency response centre told the Finnish News Agency (STT). The centre added that two airmen had ejected before the crash, sustaining minor injuries. No one was hurt in the crash, which happened in an uninhabited area. The cause of the crash was not immediately clear.

The Air Force told reporters in Jyväskylä that the aircraft's crew had been practicing pulling out of a dive at a height of more than nine kilometres (29,500 feet) when the aeroplane suffered a tail slide. The crew ejected at a height of about 4.5 kilometres after failing to restore manoeuvrability. The aircraft was flown during the test flight by a captain, 32, and a lieutenant-colonel, 44.

The aircraft had been recently built at a cost of some 15 million euros from two airframes, one of which had been damaged in a mid-air collision in 2001.

http://newsroom.finland.fi/public/defau ... wsid=23703

The plane, aka "Frankenhornet" flew for the first time just a month ago:

http://www.airforcesmonthly.com/view_news.asp?ID=1224

Some pictures by the Finnish Air Force:

http://www.ilmavoimat.fi/index.php?id=1111

Some critics say the project was doomed from the beginning... well at least the test pilots survived.

[lostinthebattle]

I guess it's finnished.






sorry I couldn't resist

[Finn47]

It certainly is...

A Finnish Accident Investigation Board search party on Friday found the flight data recorder of an F/A-18 jet that crashed the day before.

The Finnish Air Force is to begin analysing the data from the so-called black box, which is actually orange, as soon as possible.

Kimmo Nortaja, the chairman of the AIB, said the first results of the analysis would be available next week.

The two pilots ejected before the crash, suffering limb fractures. No one else was hurt in the accident.

The aircraft was completely destroyed.

The crash site is located about half a kilometre (550 yards) from the nearest houses. The Defence Forces said debris was scattered up to a radius of about 300 metres (330 yards) from the point of impact.

http://newsroom.finland.fi/public/defau ... wsid=23712

The news says, the aircraft was heading down at a speed close to 900 km/h when the pilots ejected, which may explain the limb fractures. At least the flight data recorder was recovered in good shape and the data has been downloaded already. Analyzing will take some time though.

[robbreid]

Crash site


front of CF-188B and tail of F-18C during 'mating process'.


HN-468 Finnish F-18D.

As reported in military blogs and pprune;

"Frankenhornet" (HN-468) left Patria's Halli airfield for a test flight to investigate aircraft behavior in "abnormal" flight modes followed by
an F/A-18C chase plane. The crew was a very experienced test pilot (Captain) and a flight test-engineer (Lt.Col.) with thousands of flight hours on them.

The final planned manoeuvre of the flight was to climb vertically to about 33000 ft, throttle the engines back and recover from the resulting tail slide.

As the nose dropped, the plane entered into a vertical dive. When the plane was at approximately 7000 m. (~23000 ft.) in vertical dive, the chase plane pilot radioed: "Do you have control?", to which the HN-468 pilot replied "Negative, Negative".

When the HN-468 was at an altitude of about 4500 m. (15000 ft.) in high speed vertical dive, the chase plane pilot commanded "Eject! Eject!", at which point the pilot and test-engineer ejected at an estimated speed of over 500 kt.

In the violent ejection, both crrew suffered broken limbs (not just bruises), as the M/B ejection seat installed in F/A-18D does not have arm restraints. In addition, one of the crew lost his helmet in the ejection and suffered severe facial trauma.

The plane crashed on a rocky piece of land, next to a farm field and disintegrated into very small fragments. The crew landed in a very thick forest, and even when they were located almost immediately after the crash, it took more than an hour to recover them in -22 C temperature. After recovery they were immediately transported to a hospital by a medevac helicopter, and surgically operated on thursday evening.

So, while the crew is "safe", they are not exactly quite "sound", but they're expected to survive and fully recover, which is the most important thing.

Obviously, there's a lot of speculation going on about possible causes to the loss of control, but I won't go into those...

The crash site is still being guarded by the military, citing danger of inhaling carbon-fibre fragments at the site, pretty much for the same
reason as when USN F/A-18 crashed at the approach of Miramar, San Diego last summer.

[shitdisturber]

Crash site


front of CF-188B and tail of F-18C during 'mating process'.


HN-468 Finnish F-18D.




The crash site is still being guarded by the military, citing danger of inhaling carbon-fibre fragments at the site, pretty much for the same
reason as when USN F/A-18 crashed at the approach of Miramar, San Diego last summer.

Carbon fibre fragments are a big concern when a modern fighter goes in. I spent a couple of years on the crash recovery crew in Germany; luckily we never got called out during my time, on board the crash recovery wagon were masks for all personelle involved in a search/recovery to prevent or at least reduce the potential life threatening lung issues from a burned or burning Hornet. I actually have a vague memory that 920 was one of the birds we had in Germany for a little touch of irony, but I wouldn't want to quote me on that.

[SAR_YQQ]

Carbon fibres are in modern vehicles too - remember to wear your mask next time you drive by that burning car on the highway.

[Finn47]

Today´s statement by the Air Force says flight data readout confirms the pilots ejected at approx. 5 km at a speed of 875 km/h and the pilots are out of intensive care. Next update not to be expected until end of February.