B-1 Bailout: Hazards of Flight Test

Рет қаралды 143,277

6 жыл бұрын

B-1 Flight Test Engineer Otto Waniczek recounts conditions, causes, and aftermath of the crash of a B-1 Lancer prototype that crashed on 29 August 1984. Only two of the crew members survived the bailout, sadly pilot Benefield did not. Produced by Jarel & Betty Wheaton for Peninsula Seniors www.pvseniors.org

Пікірлер: 66

@matthayward7889 6 жыл бұрын

Peninsula Seniors Consistently provides one of the best series of videos on KZfaq, a hidden Gem!

@avoidingtrees6692 5 жыл бұрын

Matt Hayward Hi Matt......definitely right..... God save the queen... Cheers from france👋

@MushroomCloudConfetti 5 жыл бұрын

@@avoidingtrees6692 Agree. So happy I stumbled upon this channel. Liberté, Égalité, Fraternité! peace from germany

@JakusJacobsen 4 жыл бұрын

You tube is the last bastion of non dumbed down video content.

@thetreblerebel 4 жыл бұрын

It is, especially you love military aviation

@davy1458 4 жыл бұрын

I agree 2 ,000,000.7 percent

@bushpilotexplorer1920 6 жыл бұрын

Hat’s off to Otto for sharing this experience with everyone. It takes a lot of courage to stand up there to talk about (and in the process re-experiencing) a terrifying event like this. Especially the part regarding losing a respected brave colleague in this way.

@mindykins1948 4 жыл бұрын

Thank you Otto. I was a supervisor/coordinator on that aircraft the day of the crash. My life changed forever. This presentation is wonderful.

@rakmanyt 4 жыл бұрын

Excellent and emotional talk, I got to see two B-1Bs take off w/ full afterburners. Highly impressive.

@LRRPF52 6 жыл бұрын

As a nav engineer in the B-1B program, I remember the events well. I was responsible for testing the offensive avionics suite and it was before the advent of GPS. Getting the navigation properly aligned with radar fixes, etc. was a challenge. Kudos to Otto for making this presentation.

@ethanbrown1235 6 жыл бұрын

fascinating, im not a senior but this is my favorite stuff to watch

@martentrudeau6948 6 жыл бұрын

Otto did a good job in presenting the events that caused the tragic death of Doug Benefield, chief test pilot. Test pilots are in a risky business, it was a sad day for the B-1 Flight Test program and an unfortunate end for Doug, may he rest in peace. Thank you.

@zoltanrichardbedo8812 5 жыл бұрын

A great man sharing his experiences with such honesty. It is super impressive! Greetings from Budapest, Hungary!

@rogerturner5504 4 жыл бұрын

Top man and also seemingly a lovely bloke! Hats off to you sir.

@jakechaney2565 5 жыл бұрын

I don’t even fly and this was really interesting. Thank you for your service Otto!

@vigleikjessen2373 6 жыл бұрын

This was truly one of your best, such a thorough and deep analysis of flight-testing gone bad. What a great job you do shearing these lectures on KZfaq!

@robertbutler2280 3 жыл бұрын

@12gauge1oz 4 жыл бұрын

The king of understatement, "the ejection was abrupt"! Thank you sir.

@JaniLuoto 6 жыл бұрын

Greetings from Helsinki, Finland. As kids these days would say: This youtube channel rocks big time.

@StephenMortimer 6 жыл бұрын

And Hello from an American "Forest Finn" (left Finland around 1740)

@vahtikoira2125 5 жыл бұрын

My great grandparents left Finland just over 100 years ago also..

@vahtikoira2125 5 жыл бұрын

I used to watch the B-1s do full afterburner touch and goes at Kirtland AFB when I was working on aircraft on the flightline at night. He's right, it's very impressive.

@arijitdakshi820 6 жыл бұрын

Insert rest points between test points. Incredible video, sorry for the loss, precious and valuable lessons.

@dbradley3 4 жыл бұрын

Great video...Worked B1 flightline @ McConnell. Peace. RIP.

@DrRich-mw4hu 5 жыл бұрын

Well presented! Thank you Otto. Dick was the hero of this tragic event. Through this sacrifice, many other injuries/deaths loss of aircraft was possibly prevented. The tragic of Doug Benefield, Senior Chief test pilot, was a blow that would have been felt throughout the community for years to come

@robwesdijk880 5 жыл бұрын

My deep respect for mr Waniczek. An honest person.

@n7565j 6 жыл бұрын

Outstanding sir!!! I remember back in 88 or 89 I was living in St Pete Fl, I was outside doing something useless when out of nowhere this huge beautiful A/C with 4 screaming engines with fire belching out the back flew over our house!!! There was an airshow going on that weekend and I'm not sure if that a/c was there for display or if it was just a fly over, but oh my what a machine!!! Thank you for shedding some light on this beautiful machine :-)

@MrAquaImage 5 жыл бұрын

Outstanding presentation and good job of capturing it on video(AND audio)!

@Alilretard1 5 жыл бұрын

The crash site for this plane/incident is not hard to find out in the Mojave desert. Sobering to stand there where it came out of the sky.

@generfeld 5 жыл бұрын

these videos are fantastic- so much awesome footage and stories. just found this channel last week. endless videos, all very long and tons of content. this is fantastic, thanks

@erictaylor5462 5 жыл бұрын

5:00 It is amazing how quickly things can go from really good to really bad. I've seen it happen in less than a second.

@Foxbat1155 5 жыл бұрын

I have used this video, not as a copy, but my interpretation of the lessons from FTE Waniczek, and his account, in a short paper on Flight Test Engineering in my Masters Program in Aerospace Engineering, thanks.

@thetreblerebel 4 жыл бұрын

You can tell this moment was the worst thing that ever happened to him. Very hard for him to talk about it, poor guy. A tough job and a national hero

@Lensman864 4 жыл бұрын

Fascinating as always. Invaluable historical documentation.

@PaulHigginbothamSr 4 жыл бұрын

at abbottsford airshow in Canada, a line B1 was there performing high performance maneuvers near the ground. As it rolled and pitched, the air was torn asunder with its control surfaces. You could visually see the turbulence off its control surfaces. It reminded me of a fighter plane only writ large. sweeeeeet!

@jh52663 6 жыл бұрын

Amazing information and unbiased honest analysis. It’d be amazing to hear from other individuals involved in test mishaps, like the X31 etc.

@104thDIVTimberwolf 4 жыл бұрын

Thank God for the lives of men like Doug Benefield. Even in their sacrifice, they teach us critical lessons that allow us to continue our missions. Every loss is one too many, , but as long as we can learn the lessons from the accident, we can wipe our tears and continue. When I was in the Air Force, I was stationed at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, where my Uncle, Major General Peter Odgers was the Commander of the B-1 SPO of the Aeronautical Systems Division, which drove my First Sergeant, Raymond Lassiter, straight out of his mind on more than one occasion. If I remember correctly, Dick Rynolds was at General Odgers's retirement ceremony in late 1987. Another of my heroes whom I got to meet. Those were the high points of my 18 years in the Military.

@Yosemite-George-61 6 жыл бұрын

great subjet... Thanks ! Well done !

@LRRPFco52 6 жыл бұрын

I remember when this happened. My dad was on B-1 CTF at the time at ED. Was a sad day/week/month for sure.

@intrepid_wandering 5 жыл бұрын

If you ever have the luxury of hearing one of these take off you will be thoroughly impressed. It would always set at least 1 or 2 car alarms off.

@Aircrewinterview 5 жыл бұрын

Very interesting!

@gustavorocha78 5 жыл бұрын

Greetings from Brazil

@sonnyburnett8725 4 жыл бұрын

I wonder why low speed data collection was done at such a low altitude at least until they had more data on how the plane handles in those areas. This poor man no doubt relives this everyday. We’re all human and these things will sadly happen and they did the best they could and like he himself said, he made certain they learned from it.

@tensevo 4 жыл бұрын

Warning Fatigue is key element in most "pilot error". The aircraft becomes the boy who cried wolf. If every movement of a parameter triggers a warning then of course over time the pilot will be conditioned to ignore the warning. I am movingmore to the position that 99% of "pilot error" could be resolved with better aircraft cockpit and systems design that accounted for human factor.

@jimzeitler6680 4 жыл бұрын

Wow, I know where I want to retire!

@ccserfas4629 6 жыл бұрын

Top Notch!

@idolhanz9842 4 жыл бұрын

The B1 is now a death trap. I went up on one at Dyess back in 87. Amazing.

@Ricky40369 5 жыл бұрын

Hi Otto !

@raoulcruz4404 4 жыл бұрын

I wonder if a place like Pancho's had existed at that time, would there have been a discussion about this? 1:06:53

@pat8988 6 жыл бұрын

Another great speaker, as always. One question I asked myself was, if insufficient airspeed was the cause of the crash, why didn't the pilot push the throttles forward?

@bend1483 6 жыл бұрын

Insufficient speed wasn't cause of the crash. Incorrect Centre of Gravity for the commanded wingsweep put the aircraft in an unstable area of the flight envelope. Once that pitch up happens the aircraft becomes divergent (the more it pitches up, the more it wants to pitch up, vicious cycle) and by that point you're really a passenger to the scene of the accident. No amount of thrust or flying skill is going to bring an aircraft thats 20+% beyond the aft CG limit back under control, specially not within the 4000ish feet they had to play with.

@Gronicle1 4 жыл бұрын

@@bend1483 Plus they didn't have any time to throttle up once they pitched up.

@afoose 4 жыл бұрын

10:30 merely simulating flutter/aero loads instead of testing them out like this really spooks me in regards to modern aircraft

@steved2623 5 жыл бұрын

Monday morning q/b. Who throttled up

@dockare 5 жыл бұрын

Could the F 111 go just as low at much high speed?

@AvengerII 5 жыл бұрын

The F-111 was MUCH faster than the B-1. Actually, one of the fastest planes on the deck AND at altitude. The F-111 could hit Mach 1.2+ at low altitude and probably go faster but as I understand it they had a temperature gauge to tell the pilot when to slow down but it was a difficult plane to chase down in clean (no external stores) condition. At low altitude, a B-1B can hit Mach 0.92-0.95 but isn't designed to go supersonic at low level. It can hold that speed at low altitude for 1700 miles or no which is a FAR longer range than any fighter than could be vectored at it. Many fighters STILL have issues with going supersonic at low altitude and they come across hard technical limitations -- oh, there are stories about some planes that AREN'T "the end all" in every situation like some people would have you believe. There's a combination of inlet and engine issues that DO limit the speeds of some planes dramatically depending on the situation. At altitude (33,000-36,000 ft), a clean F-model (the most powerful F-111 built) could achieve Mach 2.73 ... They just spilled the beans on its ultimate speed since the type will NEVER go back into service or ever fly again in American or Australian service. The planes have been grounded for good but you can still visit them in museums in the UK, Australia, or the US.

@RockyAllenLane 5 жыл бұрын

Was a B-1 ever configure with all 3 bomb bay rotary launchers loaded with live nuclear tipped cruise missiles?

@104thDIVTimberwolf 4 жыл бұрын

Definitely. That's how the 509th flew them until the end of the Cold War, unless they had a conventional mission. As it was explained to me, the more common load was two RLs with extra fuel tanks in the third bay. In DEFCON 2, though, all three bay's were hot.

@DumbledoreMcCracken 4 жыл бұрын

SRB seems superfluous

@apburner1 5 жыл бұрын

So... Benefield cause his own death because he didn't operate the FCGMS correctly?

@nikovlogs9837 4 жыл бұрын

Yeah, basically.

@dancolley4208 5 жыл бұрын

The Bone was a troubled aircraft from the beginning. A LOT of politics involved to go along with its arrogance problems. The curtain came down and it lost its mission. Now I hear that Boeing is considering turning it into a supersonic gunship. I also hear that their readiness numbers are not good. A beautiful aircraft that seems to have born under a bad sign.