Pilot Capt. Brian Bews ejects as his CF-18 fighter jet plummets to the ground during a practice flight at the Lethbridge County Airport earlier today for the weekend airshow in Lethbridge, Alberta, Canada. Amazing gallery below

 

Holy cow! Amazing set of pics. Any details on what happened?

 

Wow, they stay with the plane until the last possible second. Great shots! Hope the pilot is okay!

 

What would really suck is if he landed in the middle of the burning wreckage.

 

Only thing I could think of when I saw this was "Canada has an air force?"

 

One of the engines made a popping noise during on of the maneuvers and it was a low speed close to the ground maneuver so I am guessing the engine stalled and when it did it rolled over to the side where he ejected out of the plane and came out of it with some scrapes and bruises
I didnt know they have one either... Apparently they have maple syrup dispensers for pancakes in all their planes

 

 

Here is a very good video of the incident - the video might only load in I.E.
And another link.


The pilot was practicing a high Alpha low speed maneuver when the plane yawed off axis.

Interesting, in the first couple of pics you can see that the two engine tail cones are at different positions. I wonder if that was part of the cause of the crash, or because of the pilot's trying to compensate for engine trouble.

 

I had to go all the way to Germany in 1988 to find out Canada had an Air Force. THey would buzz our motor pool several times a week about 200 ft up. It was fun watching my fellow tankers who weren't paying attention. I'm surprised no one ever got hurt from diving off the tanks.

 

I have been lookin' at the video. Watching all the control surfaces. That plane was fighting the winds, it looks like, mostly... however...

Indeed, it is interesting about the turkey feathers... I'm not sure what that is. More on that in a little bit.

From the first link video:

:10 pops up from behind the speakers, and starts his high angle of attack (AOA) maneuver, which does slow him down.

:16 bobble from... something... Nose of the plane yaws right, then corrected. Can't really see any control surface out of the ordinary, tail cones look normal for cruise (pinched in cones, not full open cans)... although, if you were to follow the line from the top of the right rudder's back, it looks as if the rudder's deflected fairly severely to the left already... and seems to be the theme until the ejection. Matter of fact, at third and fourth glance, it seems the rudders are fairly bouncing left-straight-left, etc, just before :14 and :15...

:18, another couple of bobbles right have happened. It now looks as if as he goes slower, the plane is really fighting something. Surfaces mostly normal, rudder is again seems rather alarmingly deflected left, but at this speed and AOA, it's probably normalish, although it should be a danger signal...? Yeah, I know, fighter pilots, no issue, ok, but still. Not a lot of room to 'play' with.

:18 to :22, still more bobbling about, and plenty of rudder play, and then the ailerons get into the act, because at :21.5, the lean over to the right has started in full.

:23, it is *very* difficult to tell, but it sure looks as if *maybe* the left engine has decided to go to afterburner. It *maybe* looks like the cone is fully open, whereas the right engine's is still a cone (as looks like in the pics above) Rudder is full left, ailerons are full left, elevons are... surprisingly neutral, although still configured for high AOA.

Also, at this point, it's over, the plane is now committing itself to auger in, and the pilot is soon to realize it and punch out. Thankfully.

Nothing more is needed or can be discerened at this point without another angle of video, and/or a higher resolution video camera than this one overall.

I find it odd that the engine doesn't go full afterburner until about :23 (if I'm right, and that's not guaranteed) but even if it did, one wonders if the RIGHT engine is the problem... I don't think they use afterburner for their low speed, high AOA demonstration until when they're ready to 'leap' off the ground in a vertical climb. It's possible he might have thought about doing that, and the right engine decided to be all "naw, that's all right. I'll take the zero."

In which case, it's still puzzling, although I'm sure at that slow speed/high AOA, it's probable... the port winds that he was apparently fighting all the way through the pass, coupled with the left engine's thrust (and lack thereof, comparatively, of the right's) might have combined to just make this happen. But the very reason that the engines are close in like that is to reduce the high yaw that an engine out scenario induces. An F-14, or better yet, an SR-71, you have an engine out, they're kinda monsters to deal with on the yaw. Ditto an airliner like a 777. No big, usually, for a trained pilot, just jam on the rudder on the side the engine is running, maybe a little aileron to that side too, and it'll yaw/roll back to shape. Which is what it looks like he was trying to do, but it's really puzzling all the same with the closely coupled engines... Hm.

I sure would like more video. Ah well. I'm sure they'll figure it out. Just glad it's the plane that's the loss, overall.

/The double pops mentioned earlier are the canopy explosive bolts letting go, then the ejection seat. There is no popping from the engines that I can discern, and there is no smoke puffs or flames that indicate any engine distress, until the airplane augers, and that would seem to follow the left engine's afterburner status, from what I see, extra flames from that side only, until the fireball consumes the plane.