B-2 Crash Footage

[Kimblair13 0]

http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=f6d_1212714828

[Gawain 0]

Thank God the pilots ejected safely. The accident investigation report: http://www.acc.af.mil/accspecialreports/b-2accidentinvestigationboard.asp

So I try and I scream and I beg and I sigh
Just to prove I'm alive, and it's alright
'Cause tonight there's a way I'll make light of my treacherous life
Make light!

[JohnMitchell 16]

Dang it, that's an expensive one to return to the taxpayers.

Looks like it over rotated on takeoff, far earlier than the other one. Then it, of course, appeared to loose energy and altitude and mush towards the ground, with obvious results. Pilot error or aircraft problem? Only a thorough investigation will tell. Thank goodness for ejection seats.

[DJL 235]

They actually already have a pretty good idea as to what happened. Read the reports.

"I encourage all awesome dangerous behavior." - Jeffro Fincher

[Beerlight 0]

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Dang it, that's an expensive one to return to the taxpayers.

Looks like it over rotated on takeoff, far earlier than the other one. Then it, of course, appeared to loose energy and altitude and mush towards the ground, with obvious results. Pilot error or aircraft problem? Only a thorough investigation will tell. Thank goodness for ejection seats.

Can ya believe the B-2 has been around for 20 years?! My god our military aircraft are aging....... I think they said it was moisture (although maybe it was preventable?) that downed that massive plane......

[FlyingJ 0]

If you don't visit Speaker's Corner, check out the same thread over there that's been going for a little while with answers to some of the questions being asked.

Killing threads since 2004.

[riddler 0]

My take from the report is that one of the computers got moisture in it, causing bad data to be sent to the flight computer, which cause the aircraft to nose up drastically on takeoff. It definitely shows on the video. That caused a stall on takeoff, and at that point, it's difficult to recover. The report also said that the pilot is supposed to turn on a pitot-tube warmer to remove moisture, but did not (although it doesn't say why, but implies lack of procedural training).

Trapped on the surface of a sphere. XKCD

[FlyingJ 0]

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The report also said that the pilot is supposed to turn on a pitot-tube warmer to remove moisture, but did not (although it doesn't say why, but implies lack of procedural training).

http://www.acc.af.mil/...t/AFD-080605-058.pdf

This report says the procedures were followed and eventually moisture was being removed, but incorrect baseline data was already in the mix so even though the moisture in question might have been negated prior to take-off, the bad data was already on board. That's the way I (as a total layman) read the report anyway.

Edit: Forgot to add - looks like the procedural error was more about the order in which tasks were accomplished. Collected calibration data before mitigating the moisture problems, so it didn't really make a difference when the moisture eventually was taken care of.

Killing threads since 2004.

[JohnRich 4]

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My take from the report is that one of the computers got moisture in it, causing bad data to be sent to the flight computer, which cause the aircraft to nose up drastically on takeoff.

Don't the pilots have a way to quickly override that fly-by-computer crap if something obviously wrong is starting to happen? Or maybe that's exactly what was happening after the initial pitch-up, with the recovery efforts?

[PhreeZone 20]

The B2 and most modern military jets need the fly by wire and the computer to stay stable. There is no override since the airplanes have no stability at all with out the computer. Watch something like the F22 in level flight its its ailerons are still moving the entire time just to maintain that small about of stability that the aircraft has. You are trusting your life completly to the computers with all fly by wire aircraft.

Yesterday is history
And tomorrow is a mystery

Parachutemanuals.com

[billvon 3,119]

>Don't the pilots have a way to quickly override that fly-by-computer
>crap if something obviously wrong is starting to happen?

On many aircraft (B-2 included) the computer is the only link from the pilots to the flight surfaces. The B-2 is inherently unstable and cannot be safely flown by pilot input alone. One of the compromises in the design was to not go for inherent aerodynamic stability; this allowed more flexibility in the design, and a resulting increase in stealthiness, payload and range.