Spitfire Woes

[wellsprop]

First off, I'm glad to say the pilot escaped fine and was taken to hospital with an injured shoulder "His condition is not thought to be life threatening or changing" (from ITV news).

Sadly the Spitfire didn't fair so well, after an EFATO, the pilot managed to bring the aircraft back around to the airfield and make a good landing (any landing you can walk away from is a good landing).

Poor Spitfire, not looking too happy! It's seems it's going to be either a long term restoration or a non flyer All this said, hats off to the pilot who clearly did a fantastic job turning back to the airfield, avoiding a load of cars and a warehouse!

Ben

[noelh]

Sky or the BBC described it as a 'textbook' forced landing. Not sure which textbook they're using. But as wellsbrook says any landing you walk from is a good landing. Hope the Spitfire is restorable.

[Jon Bryon]

I saw it disappearing below the trees from my dining room window 3 miles away. Very glad the pilot survived.

Jon

[Simon Cornes]

If you can rebuilt a Spit using just a firewall then this one will take a couple of years I would say.......a little late on the round out Hoskins, someone else would have said! But he did his best and I bet he's really annoyed with himself.

[Rich G]

I would say it's possible to rebuild, doesn't look like it caught fire at all.

If you've ever seen the video of Spitfire Mk XIVc G-ALGT crashing at Woodford in 1992, you wouldn't have thought that was re-buildable but it was and it's flying again!

Hopefully the owner(s) have the money for the rebuild.

Rich

[Nigel Foster60]

The best thing here is that the pilot survived.

It does pose the perennial question of if these valuable relics of the past should be flown.

It will be interesting to see the cause of this and the other two crashes last weekend ,though I realise the Blackbushe one was not an historic aircraft.

Nigel

[bentwaters81tfw]

It does pose the perennial question of if these valuable relics of the past should be flown.

In 1968 we struggled to get a squadron of Spitfires together to make BoB. There were thought to be only 175 in existence worldwide after a survey in the '80s.

At present there are just under 50 airworthy and a Worldwide count of around +/- 220.

If we didn't fly them, (and consider the flyers are largely rebuilds of newly manufactured parts) I wonder how many would survive today?

Fly the plane, raise public awareness and interest, and we will hopefully see historic aircraft in our skies for many years to come.

As a question, usually asked by the 'Meeja', it's a no brainer!

[wellsprop]

I couldn't imagine not having any Spitfires flying. I'd rather have 50-odd Spitfires flying and some unfortunately crashing than 200 Spitfires perfectly restored sat stationary, never to fly again.

Whatever happened with this Spitfire, it's very clear that the pilot did a superb job given the close proximity of the fence, cars and trees. I struggle to pull off an engine failure in IL2 1946!

Ben

[Max Headroom]

If you've ever seen the video of Spitfire Mk XIVc G-ALGT crashing at Woodford in 1992, you wouldn't have thought that was re-buildable but it was and it's flying again!

Rich

I believe it's on its way back to flying (some bits of it anyway) but isn't there yet. When it does, the likes of FlyPast and Aeroplane Monthly will give it blanket coverage as it is one of the cadre of early Warbirds from the 60's.

Trevor