Full transcript
0:00Two experienced fighter pilots died
0:02yesterday. Their F-4 Phantom was
0:04performing at Athens Flying Week in
0:07Greece. It had been airborne for less
0:09than 3 minutes. It entered a high-speed,
0:12low-level right-hand turn, and seconds
0:14later, it flew into the ground. Now,
0:16both pilots were killed.
0:18Now, I want to be very careful with this
0:20video because there is already an
0:22official investigation underway, and I
0:23do not know what caused this accident.
0:26Nobody outside that investigation does,
0:28but I've watched the footage many times,
0:31and there are two things that concern
0:33me. Not necessarily mechanical things,
0:36human things.
0:40Now, things can happen inside the body
0:41of a perfectly fit, perfectly competent
0:43fighter pilot, and I know about one of
0:45them for a very personal reason because
0:48in 2011, something remarkably difficult
0:50to understand happened to a friend of
0:53mine. His name was John Egging, and he
0:56was a pilot in the Red Arrows. Now, I
0:58don't particularly like talking about
0:59it, and I try and avoid this, but today,
1:01I think I should, and we will
1:04later on. Now, the aircraft involved in
1:06Greece was a two-seat Hellenic Air Force
1:08F-4E Phantom from 338 Squadron. Don't
1:11make the mistake of thinking this was
1:13simply some museum piece 1960s fighter
1:16being dragged out for an air show. It
1:18wasn't. It was an upgraded F-4E AUP, or
1:22Aircraft Upgrade Program, aircraft from
1:26an operational Hellenic Air Force
1:27Squadron. Now, according to the Hellenic
1:29Air Force, the accident happened at
1:31about 14:55,
1:33around 3 nautical miles southeast of
1:35Tanagra.
1:36Major Ioannis Balisiotis 40, Captain
1:39Dimitrios Petrou was 37, and both were
1:43killed.
1:44The available footage shows the Phantom
1:46in a low-level right-hand turn
1:48immediately before impacting the ground.
1:52As I said, one eyewitness told Greek
1:53television that it had been airborne for
1:55less than 3 minutes.
1:57And that timing immediately caught my
2:00attention.
2:01Cuz when you fly fast jets, there is
2:03something we take very seriously. And
2:06that is G awareness.
2:09You see, before exposing ourselves to
2:10significant G, we normally conduct what
2:13broadly is called a G warm. I teach it
2:16in Shadow Lands, my digital combat
2:18school online.
2:20Now, you're preparing the cardiovascular
2:22system for what it's about to undertake.
2:25You're basically checking yourself.
2:27You're establishing that you're ready
2:29for what you're about to demand from
2:31your body.
2:33And here's the first question I had
2:34watching this.
2:36How much G was that aircraft pulling?
2:38How rapidly was the G applied? And what
2:41physiological preparation had the crew
2:43done before it? Now, I don't know. All
2:46right, the investigation will establish
2:48all of that, but this does matter
2:49because G doesn't simply make you feel
2:52heavy.
2:54Under positive G, blood is being driven
2:56away from the brain. At sufficient
2:59levels, your brain isn't receiving
3:00enough oxygenated blood to function
3:03normally. And everybody knows about
3:05G-LOC. G-induced loss of consciousness.
3:09Lights out, basically.
3:11But there's another condition that I
3:12think is actually more interesting in
3:14this accident.
3:16A-LOC.
3:17Almost loss of consciousness. And
3:19there's a terrible reason that I know
3:21quite a lot about it.
3:23On 20th of August, 2011, Flight
3:25Lieutenant Jon Egging was flying Red 4
3:27with the Royal Air Force Aerobatic Team,
3:29the Red Arrows, when he was killed.
3:33I knew Jon.
3:34Before his Red Arrows selection, he came
3:35through RAF Valley for his workup
3:37sorties, the sorties they do before they
3:38try and join the team. And I was an
3:40instructor there at the time, and I flew
3:42those sorties with him.
3:44They're in my logbook on the shelf
3:45behind me.
3:46And I don't say that to make this story
3:47about me, because it's not. I say it
3:50because what happened to Jon
3:52fundamentally changed my understanding
3:54of what G can do to a pilot.
3:57And I was one of three men who went on
3:59to investigate his death. In fact, I am
4:01an author of a service inquiry or the
4:03accident report itself.
4:06Now, I've already spoken about John's
4:07accident. There are people connected
4:09with it who are still here.
4:11There is family, friends, so I think it
4:13deserves some restraint. But the
4:15official investigation is enormously
4:17relevant to what we are discussing now.
4:21John completed the Bournemouth Air
4:22Display
4:23successfully with the team.
4:25But during the subsequent break to land,
4:27his Hawk reached approximately 6.3 G.
4:31And that was the highest G that he
4:32experienced in the whole display.
4:35The onset rate of the G, the rate at
4:37which he got to that G, peaked at
4:39approximately 6.5 G per second. That's
4:43higher than what a Typhoon pulls.
4:45And then something extraordinary
4:47happened.
4:48The aircraft continued flying.
4:50John continued controlling it, but the
4:53control strategy became abnormal.
4:56The investigation found the likely
4:57trigger occurred about 5 seconds after
4:59the break began.
5:01The aircraft wasn't behaving normally,
5:03and under normal circumstances, the
5:05report concluded that would have been
5:07obvious to the pilot, but he didn't
5:09react, and the aircraft impacted the
5:11ground.
5:12So, what happened to John then?
5:15Well, the inquiry's eventual conclusion
5:16was G-induced impairment, and
5:19significantly what we call a lock. And
5:22A-lock is important because it isn't the
5:24same thing as simply fainting in the
5:26cockpit. With classical G-lock or
5:29G-induced loss of consciousness, you
5:31lose consciousness and muscle tone.
5:36>> Pull to recover.
5:37Pull to recover.
5:39Pull to recover.
5:41Pull to recover.
5:53>> Tony, knock it off. Tony, knock it off.
5:55>> Tony, knock it off.
5:56>> The report says initial recovery can
5:58take up to 15 seconds, followed
5:59potentially by another 30 seconds before
6:02somebody properly appreciates their
6:04situation and can take appropriate
6:06recovery action. But ALOC
6:08is different.
6:11The pilot can remain physically capable
6:12of manipulating the controls whilst
6:14being cognitively and functionally
6:17impaired.
6:19Now, think about the significance of
6:21that.
6:22The aircraft can still be being flown.
6:25There can still be somebody holding the
6:27stick, and there can still be control
6:29inputs, but the brain behind those
6:31inputs is no longer operating normally.
6:35That is frightening.
6:37It's one reason I don't look at an
6:38accident like the Phantom here and
6:39immediately think,
6:41"Why didn't he just pull up?"
6:43Cuz human beings aren't machines.
6:45And now we come to something completely
6:47different, and I used to discuss this
6:49with my fast jet students.
6:51It's called the G-excess illusion.
6:54Inside your inner ear are the otolith
6:56organs. They help your brain determine
6:58orientation by sensing gravity and
7:01linear acceleration, but there's a
7:03problem.
7:05You see, the system evolved as human
7:06beings walking around at 1 G. Now, you
7:09put that human being into a fighter
7:11aircraft pulling four, five, or six
7:13times the force of gravity,
7:15and things become rather more
7:17interesting because under increased G,
7:19the otolith response becomes
7:21disproportionately strong.
7:24Now, move your head around, and the
7:26brain can misinterpret what it's
7:28receiving.
7:29In fact, the RAF's own Central Flying
7:31School Manual of Flying describes this
7:33quite well. It says, "The sensation can
7:36be extremely powerful when the head is
7:38moving quickly."
7:39And here's the interesting bit.
7:42Looking up and into a turn can produce a
7:45sensation that the aircraft is under
7:47banked and it is nose up.
7:49The pilot's correction can therefore
7:51produce an over bank and nose down
7:54attitude. That's not something I've
7:56invented after watching this accident by
7:57the way. G excess has been studied for
8:00decades.
8:01Back to NASA research specifically
8:04identified it as a concern in high speed
8:06deeply banked turns at low level.
8:11An aerospace medicine literature
8:12describes accidents involving fighter
8:14and attack aircraft roughly pulling two
8:16to five and a half G at low level where
8:19pilots were looking outside for another
8:21aircraft or object over banked and
8:24descended into terrain.
8:28And this isn't just aero medical theory.
8:31I remember an RF Hawk accident back in
8:331999 when I was still in flying
8:36training.
8:37Hawk T1 from 100 Squadron crashed near
8:39Shap in Cumbria during a low level
8:42evasion sortie. You think about air
8:43combat but done about 250 ft above the
8:46ground.
8:47The crash killed both Squadron Leader
8:49Mike Andrews and Flight Lieutenant Steve
8:51Todd.
8:52I remember that very accident quite
8:54clearly.
8:56G excess and spatial disorientation are
8:58relevant for moment phenomena when
9:00trying to understand accidents in this
9:02sort of environment although I should be
9:04clear that the publicly available
9:06findings into Shap also considered
9:08workload, fatigue, distraction. I'm not
9:10claiming G excess was established as the
9:12definitive cause here but on the
9:13squadrons at the time
9:15we felt that this was probably the case.
9:19But now let's come back to this Phantom.
9:22Cuz there's something else here which I
9:23think is
9:25extremely important and that is height
9:27information.
9:28You see in the Hawk T1 that I flew we
9:31didn't have a radar altimeter. The
9:33Phantom does.
9:35But But, a problem.
9:37At sufficiently steep bank angles, the
9:39Phantom's radar altimeter can lose a
9:41reliable return from the ground, and
9:43this aircraft is in a very, very steep
9:45turn.
9:46So, now look at the complete picture.
9:48You're low.
9:49You're fast. You're pulling significant
9:51G. You're potentially looking up and
9:53into the turn. Your vestibular system
9:56may be giving you misleading information
9:58about the aircraft's attitude.
10:01And the instrument designed to give you
10:03an independent indication of your height
10:05above the ground may itself be degraded
10:07by the attitude of the aircraft. That is
10:10an extraordinarily unforgiving
10:12combination for any crew.
10:15Now, watch the Phantom again. It's in
10:16that hard turn, isn't it?
10:18It's low. The crew are potentially
10:20pulling significant G, and in a display
10:23maneuver, where are you looking? Not
10:25down at your instruments. You're looking
10:26outside, aren't you? You're looking
10:28around the turn. You're looking to line
10:30up on the runway, your line feature.
10:33Potentially, you're looking up through
10:34that canopy into that turn.
10:37And this is why I find the accident so
10:38interesting
10:40cuz I want to emphasize again, I'm not
10:42saying either of these things caused
10:43this accident. We're not going to know
10:45for a while. There could have been a
10:46mechanical failure, of course, couldn't
10:47there? There could have been a control
10:49problem. I mean, the F-4E is, after all,
10:51dual controlled.
10:53Or something completely invisible could
10:55have happened in the footage, like a
10:56bird strike coming through the canopy.
10:58The Greek Air Force has investigators
11:00with access to evidence that I don't
11:02have.
11:03And I will defer to them. They are the
11:05experts, but from a fast jet pilot's
11:06perspective,
11:08these two physiological conditions
11:09immediately jumped out at me.
11:12Number one, G-induced impairment.
11:15And number two, G-excess
11:18illusion.
11:19So, what's the lesson here?
11:21Well, the lesson is that the machine
11:23isn't always the limit. People look at
11:25fighter pilots and imagine the
11:26extraordinary aircraft, don't they? The
11:28F-4 Phantom has two enormous J79
11:30engines. You can light the reheat and
11:32accelerate with tremendous force, but
11:34sometimes the most vulnerable component
11:36in any fighter aircraft isn't the
11:38engines at all. It isn't the hydraulic
11:40system or the flying controls.
11:43It's a human being sitting inside the
11:44cockpit, and that human being can be
11:47experienced. They can be fit. They can
11:49be current and highly trained and still
11:51be defeated by
11:53physiology.
11:55John Ekin was an exceptionally capable
11:56fast jet pilot, annoyingly so, and he
11:59was also a bloody great bloke to be
12:00fair.
12:01The investigation I did with the two
12:03other guys considered disorientation,
12:05distraction, aircraft serviceability,
12:07and
12:08other explanations. We found the most
12:10likely cause was G-induced impairment.
12:13A-lock.
12:14Leading to controlled flight into
12:16terrain. And that's why I think this
12:18Greek accent deserves a little bit of
12:20patience.
12:21There was also value in examining what
12:24the footage can teach us without
12:25pretending that we know the answer
12:28because
12:29sometimes an aircraft accident isn't
12:31caused by somebody doing something
12:32stupid.
12:34Sometimes a pilot is doing something
12:35he's done 100 times before.
12:39And then
12:40for a few seconds, the extraordinary
12:42complicated machine that is the human
12:43body
12:45simply doesn't behave the way you'd
12:46expect it to.
12:48And at low level
12:50for a few seconds
12:51that's all it takes.
12:53Appreciate your time, guys.
12:55Tim Davies fast jet performance.