Fresh restore for sale on Barnstormers, anyone seen it?

[Merlinspop]

Good Good Friday to all,

Looking though Barnstormers this afternoon I saw this:

http://barnstormers.com/listing.php?id=643838

Anyone in the Virginia Beach area know anything about this plane? It sure looks nice, which always scares me!

Also... just saw the news about the Navy Jet crash. Sure hope no one on the ground was harmed. Initial pictures didn't look good at all! Glad the crew got out.

Bruce

[Hank Jarrett]

Re: Fresh restore for sale on Barnstormers, anyone seen it?

Yes, it is Rays plane and is as nice as it looks. REALLY nice restoration, but he has too many projects and needs to thin the herd. If you think you might be interested, call soon. He has a live one on the line and the sale is held up for need of a ferry pilot to get it to Kansas City.
Hank

[Hank Jarrett]

Re: Fresh restore for sale on Barnstormers, anyone seen it?

Guess I didn't address the F-18 crash. Spent about 20 years doing crash investigations for the Navy and this one on the local news has made me remember why eye witnesses gave the most worthless information. The crew WERE NOT STUDENTS! The crew were both full fledged Naval Aviators. The squadron is the RAG where crew go for detailed training for the specific type aircraft, in this case F-18s, NOT to become pilots (IDIOT reporters!). The plane DID NOT dive vertical into the park in a "heroic effort" by the crew to miss the apartment complex. It doesn't even LOOK like an apartment complex from the air! They (the witnesses) were yacking about how careful they were to avoid the school and museum (REALLY! 30*+ off the track of the planes?) Most people in the area don't even know where that "museum" is or what it is. I have lived here for 40 years and been in it ONCE (and I am a museum guy). From the number of people around it, it would probably have been a good place to hit. No one ever there, and burning the "art" I saw would be a community improvement.

The good news is. so far looks like NO fatalities! Amazing! The plane hit the tops of some apartment houses and landed in a small park between the buildings. One crewman ended up on a guys back porch with his chute on the house. Looks like a bloody nose was his big hit. Both crewmen were taken to Virginia Beach General and one has already been released. They said the other one was still there but not life threatening. They also had several people treated for smoke inhalation and they put out warnings for everyone SSE of the crash to keep windows closed because of the burning carbon fibers (the smoke from that stuff will mess up your lungs and anything electronic it gets in to). We just had a major emergency response drill here for just this kind of thing and it really paid off. The response teams were great. Lots of military folks in the area lots of people pitching in in the first critical minutes probably saved a lot of lives. Looks like about 5 apartment buildings burned or destroyed by the plane. Two have been swept so far and no one killed. We are praying the great weather today got everyone out having fun in the sun and not at home watching soaps. Some of the buildings look like London in the Blitz. Big apartment buildings flattened, but no bodies. God how we hated finding the bodies. Lots of bad memories tonight and prayers for a miracle that no one was in the buildings today. The beach is a short distance away and the sky was blue with nice sunshine and a little cool. Perfect day to go to the beach front. I hope they all did.
Hank

[jim cooper]

Re: Fresh restore for sale on Barnstormers, anyone seen it?

Interesting report on CNN that a few years back, the Navy, realizing that it might be prudent to close this base and go out in the boonies, attempted to move but politics got in the way, speeches by the congressman and senator, etc etc. so they stayed. Further reported Instructor in rear seat, transition pilot in front, when it got a hair in its throat. Personally I would have punched out a little sooner. There was little they could do but get OUT! JC

[Hank Jarrett]

Re: Fresh restore for sale on Barnstormers, anyone seen it?

The water was literally seconds away (and a big splash instead of a cluster of burning buildings). I am not talking about a lot of seconds, WELL under 5 seconds, and there is a real drive among Naval aviators to get "feet wet" in an emergency.
This will bring all the BRAC discussions back, but one of the advantages of NAS Oceana is how FAST you can be over the water when there is an emergency. The problem is the space between the ends of the runways and the water becomes prime real estate BECAUSE of the Naval base. Move the base, and the same problems will be back in a few decades (or a lot less). There were lots of reasons to BRAC Oceana, and lots of reasons to stay. The decision to keep Oceana was based on good arguments, not politics, and I think it was the right one. The biggest public complaint was noise and it's impact on property value, not safety. It was a STUPID argument. The people who tried to use it refused to recognize they BOUGHT a lot of house for cheap because of the noise, then wanted to complain when the same noise pushed their asking price down when they wanted to sell. I have lived around lots of aviation my whole life. Believe me, very quickly you don't even consciously hear it, but you DO look up if the sound isn't "right". When there is a base involved, especially the master jet base for the Navy, there IS no "boonies". North East of the base (where the crash happened) is the highest density area around the base, but you are only over it for a short time.
As for what is reported in the news, I would suggest you ignore it. They get much more wrong than right. The wreck looks like an F-18D to me (based on the ECM antenna on the two vertical tails in the photos. Sorry bout that, but there is no stick in back on an F-18D. If the GIB was an instructor, he was NOT instructing on how to fly the plane.
Nothing anyone says right now means a thing (including me). I used to be the guy getting dirty at this point in the investigation and the only real humor we had was hearing all the speculation and "eye witness" reports. In 20 years I only had ONE GUY accurately describe a crash. He was SO ON TARGET we went back to ask how he could remember in such detail exactly how the plane behaved as it came down. He said he was an R/C pilot and he had a LOT of experience watching planes crash. Like EVERY WEEKEND. Every other witness got major details completely wrong based on the final investigation. Even aviation professionals.
Hank

[Pearson]

Re: Fresh restore for sale on Barnstormers, anyone seen it?

I am just waiting for one of the TV talking heads to imply that the crash was caused because, "the pilot did NOT file a flight plan". That one gets me every time.

[Hank Jarrett]

Re: Fresh restore for sale on Barnstormers, anyone seen it?

Haven't heard that one yet. Maybe the local news guys are at least smarter than that. The good news so far is they have searched the rubble in all five buildings and there have been NO CASUALTIES! Looks like the apartments that took a direct hit were not occupied at the time and everyone in the other apartments got out safely.
Looks like a lot of people around here live right. We have a whole community that are all very thankful.
Hank

[jim cooper]

Re: Fresh restore for sale on Barnstormers, anyone seen it?

A good friend flew out of there years ago. (He was a back seater in an F4 in Vietnam.) He said the place "made you pucker" even back then and they were talking of getting out of there even then! When you look at the view from the air on TV, there is no room at all for error or malfunction. IF they could have made the water.....but as Winston Churchill said "IF is the most important word in the english dictionary." A State Senator got on TV and blew alot of hot gas about the whole thing, the heroics of the pilots, etc etc. but if I were an instuctor there I'd try to get a transfer. Its a miracle no one was injured badly or killed. It looked as though at least 100 people could easily have been killed......and then of course there would be much more discussion of the base closing.JC