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Death of a B-2 While doing some research for other purposes I ran across this excellent video of a B-2 stalling and crashing on takeoff. If you have the vaguest interest in aviation I am sure you will find this as fascinating as I did.
All escaped unscathed except the USAF budget.
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Now imagine that happening 570 times, and you have the stimulus bill.
Fascinating. Back in the old days that’d have been a no-brainer ‘pilot error’ call but apparently it was actually a malfunction of the flight control system due to a heavy rain buggering up some of the system sensors.
I flew out of Guam (where the crash happened) during the Vietnam war and most people wouldn’t believe how hard it can rain there. Rain coming down at four inches an hour is pretty impressive.
Actually, come to think of it, building and subsequently destroying over 500 B2 bombers would probably be much better for the economy. After they are all destroyed, there is no pressure to continue the program.
Yes, it does show off that one itty bitty problem with an aircraft that is not only fly-by-wire, but could not possibly be kept in the air manually. If the system gets bad data in, you are royally effed.
The FBW systems are pretty good though. This is the first time in recent history that I have heard of one failing, and in actuality the only thing that failed were some input sensors. And to be fair, if you are on instruments on an old cable and bellcrank controlled aircraft, you can be just as royally screwed if your pitot or static air source go south and your instruments start reading incorrectly. This can lead to aircraft-ground impingement events that ruin your night.
I’m sure you know what the most common last words of pilots are?
“shit”
It is closely followed by a four letter acronym from the Royal Navy’s Man O’War days.
Just another software bug. Too bad, but a few lines of code will fix the problem.