In 1986, a captain decided to perform one of the riskiest maneuvers in aviation, resulting in a total loss of control of his aircraft. Don't forget to sub, like, share and comment for more flight reconstructions!
"Common aerobatics do not over stress an aircraft. Recovery from poorly executed maneuvers can." Tom Weis. My instructor. This guy let his nose down and fell out of the maneuver. Well he must have had nose up back pressure when inverted. A roll is a dance with all three controls. "Tex" Johansen rolled the Boing 80 and said it was a one G maneuver.
@@williampotter2098 That is done with a smooth coordinated application of aileron, rudder and elevator. The elevator neutralizes and reverses as the aircraft inverts. As my instructor once sad "Notice how the airspeed builds in this attitude. Cut the throttle back on the yoke, DON'T PULL THE WINGS OFF! I had fallen out of a simple maneuver. The airspeed was well into the yellow. I think the Russian had the same as the aircraft inverted.
@@jayreiter268 Yes, I was trained in the USAF. We did that in 4-ship formation in T-38s. And I fell out of many barrel rolls while learning. It's harder than it looks.
That was not a barrel roll, that was an improperly executed aileron roll. If done by the numbers, it is not a particularly dangerous maneuver. 1. Pitch the nose up (the pilot didn't pitch up at all), 2. RELAX the back pressure, and 3. apply maximum aileron in the direction of the roll. It takes a surprising degree of nose up attitude for a plane with a slow rate of roll as once the back pressure is released, the nose will drop towards the ground all the way through the maneuver. The next major mistake some pilots make is to not relax the back pressure on the yoke when starting the roll. That turns the maneuver into a sort of barrel roll with the nose pitching all through the maneuver such that as the aircraft reaches the inverted position half way through the maneuver, the pilot is actually pulling the nose towards the ground, resulting in an extreme nose down attitude as the roll is completed. This mistake likely caused the loss of a Navy EA-6B on a low level training flight near Spokane some years ago.
Bob is correct - at no time should the load on the aircraft exceed 1.5 G. The pilot should know the correct entry speed, (I'll bet it's not in the flight manual!) and ensure that the aircraft is at that speed before lowering the nose a little in a left bank for a right barrel roll. The nose is then raised while the aircraft is rolled to the right, not about its axis, but along a horizontal corkscrew flight path, finishing in level flight. You do not point the aircraft at the ground, and you do actually lose some speed during the manoeuvre. Correct use of rudder is just as important as aileron during the manoeuvre, in order to keep the nose aligned with the flight path.
I think - not being a pilot or even student of aviation - I get the difference between an aileron roll and a barrel roll. Is an aileron roll a roll with the aircraft spinning round the same "string" line of flight whereas a barrel roll involves rotating round inside a mythical barrel at a constant radius from the "string" which is the nominal line of flight?
Not being a pilot but having been in a simulator I asked if I could try a barrel roll in a regional airlinersim ( motion turned off) and apparently did it right. I indeed acted as if I steered inside a pipe, using all controls. I doubt I'd fare as well IRL.
Man did ANYONE on board have any common sense to think "gee this isn't a fighter jet, maybe a barrel roll is a bad idea."? To die so needlessly on an otherwise perfectly flying aircraft. Total pilot error.
Not so much pilot error as depending on his skill negligence incompetence ignorance not really an error in the sense of the word I would consider for piloting, certainly and despicable airmanship
i'm also quite lost here, because it said they're testing the collapsed nose gear being fixed or not, so why did they need to perform the left/right turn before executing the barrel roll?
It’s a well known story in aviation that, in 1955 Boeing test pilot Tex Johnston performed a barrel roll with a new 707. During the roll a +1 g acceleration was maintained, allowing for the famous pouring a drink while inverted. The trick is in the pilots skill and knowledge of aerodynamics. This accident seems to fit perfectly with pervasive macho attitudine in Russian colture.
its happened in the US too . the Braniff accident in 1959 in a brand new 707 ..A barrel roll by a Boeing test pilot to impress the Braniff pilots on board . there were no commercial passengers much like this flight .. and three engines were ripped off .. however there were some survivors who went to the back of the aircraft .
Few people know that Tex Johnson had practiced rolling the plane plane the day before while test flying out over the Olympic mountains. It wasn't just a stunt. Doing it over 125,000 people at the Seattle Sea-fair Hydro-plane event was the stunt but Johnson was a top notch engineer who knew everything there was to know about the plane. The real question is would you try this in a new Boeing?
The indestructible 707 was built with military idiosyncracy. Whatever it takes. The 50's... WWII and Korea were very fresh. In the Soviet front, it was some similarity with the TU114... high wing bomber TU95, aka "the 🐻"
Kelly Johnson successfully did this manoeuvre in a Boeing 707 when it was the Dash-80. The pilot of the Yak 40 pointed the nose of the plane too far down towards the ground and the wing ripped off from the stress of the overspeed.
The dash 80 was rolled by Boeing test pilot Alvin "Tex" Johnston. Kelly Johnson IS a real aerospace legend but at Lockheed NOT Boeing. He worked on U-2 SR-71 C-130 and MANY more greats.
I was thinking that exact same thing! I found myself wondering if the Yak-40 pilot was trying to emulate that maneuver? "If capitalist pig pilot can do this 29 years ago in poorly built inferior aircraft, I can easily do in glorious superior Soviet plane!" All respect to those who lost their live that day.
@@austindarrenor I read an article about that some 40 years ago which said the Bill Avery almost had a heart attack right then and there, and intended to fire Tex, until Eddie Rickenbacker told him: "He (Tex) just sold your airplane for you."
During my airline career (UAL), most of the simulator check rides would have a few minutes of time left over at the end, and the check pilot would ask what we would like to do. I'd always go for a few aileron rolls. Done in the B727/B737/B757/B767/B777. The secret was to get the nose well above the horizon (~30 degrees), crank in full aileron and then neutralize the elevator once the pitch up was established. I always tried to come out a little higher than I started. Just like in the Globe Swift I owned. During training the instructor gave me a unannounced roll upset at about 10k feet. As the sim went through about 120' bank, and I had no idea why, I just "went with the flow" and finished the rather sloppy roll. Lost some altitude bur did not exceed barber pole or G limits. But the instructor was annoyed. Those were the days...
A Barrel Roll, also known as a 1 g roll if done properly doesn't damage the aircraft. Tex Johnston did two of these maneuvers on the first Boeing 707, the Boeing 367-80. He did this over Lake Washington during Seafair in 1955.
I have been a commercial pilot since 1970. A Barrel Roll is far from being the most dangerous maneuver in commercial aviation. In fact it’s one of the simplest and less stressful acrobatic maneuvers in aviation. The reason this one caused the aircraft to break up is because the pilot did not do it properly. It’s a maneuver that when done properly should not produce more than 2 to 3 Gs. Many acrobatic pilots do it with only 1 to 1.5 Gs and no less than .5 Gs. Two to 3 Gs should not have caused the aircraft to break up. Granted the pilot should not have attempted the maneuver, as I’m sure the airline prohibits acrobatic maneuvers.
Tex Johnson rolled a 707 over Lake Washington at Seattle in the 50s, and technicians aboard didn't even notice. It was a perfect 1G roll. Afterward, the CEO of the company asked him, "What do you think you were doing up there?", and Tex replied, "Selling airplanes". There is footage of the incident on RU-vid...
I don't even like doing spins in an approved airplane like the C172. I rather do instrument work and procedures; I'm a standard-rate-of-turn guy. Occasionally a 60 Deg step turn, but no more than that.
A barrel roll can be done in virtuall any aircraft. The most famous barrel roll was done by the Boeing 707 prototype during the first public flight of the airplane in order to sell the airplane to airliners. They sold hundreds of them the following week. A barrel roll done properly should NEVER exceed 2 Gs. The Yak-40 in the video did a split S.
@@michaelrunnels7660 That's a persistently annoying fact that can't be flushed from the history books. Tex flew an aileron roll, not a barrel roll. A barrel roll involves at least 40 degrees of pitch. It's half aileron roll and half loop.
@@gerardmoran9560 Are you saying that a barrel roll is half aileron roll and half loop? That's a split S. Imagine doing a coordinated turn to the left, but never neutralizing the ailerons and rudder so your turn gets steeper and steeper until it goes past knife edge. You keep the coordinated turn going and pull back on the stick to keep 1 G. Keep turning and pulling 1 G until you are at right knife edge, then start forward on the stick until you turn to wings level. If you do this continuous coordinated turning at the correct rate you will end up about 30 degrees nose low. If you start about 30 degrees nose high you will end up wings level. Passengers with their eyes closed will say you just did a coordinated turn. A roll involves using the ailerons only and the aircraft rolls around a line going straight thru the fuselage. A roll involve pushing the stick forward until you are upside down pulling 1 negative G. Here's Tex doing a barrel roll starting from level flight and ending up about 30 degrees nose low. Tex talks about doing a chandell, but it isn't shown in this video. ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-Ra_khhzuFlE.html Here's Bob Hoover doing a barrel roll starting 30 degrees nose up and ending up straight and level. ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-V9pvG_ZSnCc.html
Exactly! May the Lord bless their innocent souls. Hard to understand, considering the Soviet pilots were all air force trained, where such a manoeuvre is part of the basic curriculum.
A properly executed "Barrel roll" is a 1G maneuver, without a significant speed increase. Bob Hoover had done hundreds, safely. This guy wasn't trained in the proper method.
@@JeffreyWilliams-dr7qe Admittedly, some planes do not do well when they get inverted, but the true "barrel" maneuver is 1 G. Look up Bob Hoover actually pouring Ice Tea into a glass while doing one. Full 360 degrees. My guess is this Russian pilot thought he knew how but was not able to do the roll correctly--He paid for it... I'm part Russkie and know some of us have bigger testicles than brains.
A subtlety misrepresented in most movies and narratives is the difference between an in-line/aileron roll (where the aircraft is only meant to roll on its longitudinal axis) and a barrel-roll which involves yaw and pitch as well. Look up the diagram how this looks. Apparently this pilot also didn't understand the difference nor ever understood how to execute it properly... Nor should he have attempted it even if he did. Mind you during the days of the USSR most of their pilots came from air force training which was notorious for reckless bravado. Perhaps he thought a civilian airliner can do the same maneuvers as a fighter jet.
Barrel and aileron rolls are not intrinsically dangerous. The key element for safe execution is sufficient aileron authority to complete the roll before the pitch attitude is too low to allow safe recovery prior to exceeding limiting airspeed. .
A barrel roll is not a dangerous maneuver. If executed properly it is a one g maneuver and would not have over stressed the aircraft. It is clear that the captain let the nose drop. That is the only way this maneuver could produce a high speed that would over stress the airframe. A Boeing test pilot once did a barrel roll in a B-52 with no problems.
That was probably Alvin "Tex" Johnston as he was Boeing's Chief Test pilot through the B-47, B-52, and 707-80 programs. It was said he routinely barrel rolled B-47s over the Straits of Juan de Fuca. While flying a B-47, he radioed to flight test control asking if the '47 could be barrel rolled. They answered, "hold on, we'll get back to you." After about 40 min they told him, " yes, you probably can, but it's not a good idea." Tex's reply, "too late."
Well, you only say that now with the aid of hindsight. This was a long time ago. Your prediction would hold more merit if you had made it right after this happened, not 40 years later.
Great story and such a stupid thing to do. But your animations were terrific. Loved the black reek from the engines. No Greta Thunbergs in those days. 😀😀🙋♂️👏👏🇬🇧
No. Most crashes with Russian airliners came because of weather, ATC mistakes or other external reasons. A Tu-134 or 154 is not less safe than a 737 Max....
@@janvanhaaster2093 And yet they were commercial failures. None of the Russian made jets were sold to airlines in countries outside of the Soviet Bloc.
I think you're right. In a communist country the spirit of quality is so often utterly lacking. There's no personal initiative. Everything you do is for the State.
A properly conducted barrel roll is a one G maneuver. It tends to side load the vertical fin/rudder assembly, but most aircraft should be able to handle it. What gets screwed up are the gyro's, which can "tumble" and in some cases require replacement. This is not an approved maneuver in any airline equipment!
If you’re not a test pilot or an aerobic pilot check out on the aircraft. Don’t do crap like this. My skating instructor said most people get injured in skating doing things I haven’t been taught to do properly.
this is misinformation: a barrel roll is not a dangerous stunt, in fact, the 747 pilot did a barrel roll on the demonstration flight, it does not increase or decrease G-forces by much. The only reason the wing fell if is because they did not do a barrel roll, the captain completely failed doing it and did something entirely different
The First officer should have stopped it (but things are different in the Third World). From the video, it's apparent that the pilot had no experience with aerobatics. He could have easily aborted the maneuver at 90 degrees of bank when it was apparent things weren't going well (but it takes an aerobatic pilot to recognize that). Starting the roll at 5 degrees nose up isn't nearly enough for a barrel roll in that type of plane, not even for an aileron roll. The aircraft is perfectly capable of those maneuvers, but the pilot was not. The B-707 has performed barrel rolls before without any issues. If performed correctly, it produces no more stress than a normal steep turn. Heck, Bob Hoover did them at airshows with both engines feathered while pouring a glass of water. All pilots are not the same. BC 26,000+ hrs USAF/Airlines Aerobatic/Formation Instructor
I take the video with a degree of cynicism as it is a computer simulation based on what the creator of the video thinks happened. It is not confirmed that this from a full data set from a FDR though the CVR seems real time. Were the control inputs and positions available from the FDR or just the usual speed, attitude, altitude and engine settings? Maybe some information on the histories of the respective crew members? Maybe some poetic license.
As an aerobatic pilot I can say there is nothing dangerous about performing a roll. The pilot screwed it up from the very beginning. I have seen a pilot roll a 727 with absolutely no stress of any kind on the aircraft.
A barrel roll is certainly NOT a dangerous maneuver. And if executed correctly, the g force is at 1 G all through the roll. And - still if executed correctly - the nose would NOT drop below the horizon, so the aircraft would NOT gain speed. If the crew would have done a barrel roll, they'd have been fine.
Not saying this wasn't totally reckless but a barrel roll isn't just rolling the aircraft around its own long axis, that's an aileron roll. A barrel roll is flying in a spiral both rolling and turning the aircraft around on the surface of an imaginary tube, which is the "barrel" If done correctly a barrel roll is a 1 g manoeuvre and doesn't put excessive stress on an aircraft, it's definitely not the most dangerous of aerobatic manoeuvres.
Others may've said this, but a correctly executed barrel roll performed by a competent and experienced pilot is not a dangerous maneuver. In fact, it can be done such that even when carrying passengers, unless they were looking out the windows at the time, would not be aware that they had been inverted. However, you can be darn sure that every year some wannabe aerobatic pilot will kill themselves and a passenger that they were seeking to impress by trying it with no safety margin. Surely the Yak 40 was built to go beyond 5G? It was probably exceeding the Vne in an asymmetric attitude that tore the wing away.
With a straight-winged aircraft at that altitude? Nobody considered its flight envelope? Getting to 90 degrees and being well below the horizon seems like a good time to abort the maneuver, but instead they doubled down.
The captain should never have performed a barrel roll in the first place. His foolish actions caused structural failure of the Yakovlev, thereby costing him his life and that of his crew. Tragic indeed. 😢
Doing a barrel roll after doing some gentle turns is like an old man taking a walk around the block and then trying to do a floor exercise like an Olympic gymnast. Not gonna turn out well. The barrel roll, however, should not have produced 5Gs. It’s a one G maneuver.
The barrel roll is by far not the most dangerous figure. It has been done with a boeing 707 on a demo flight for potential customers, the boeing company was not too happy with that, there was a picture taken from the cockpit while the liner was upside down.
as far as I know, commercial engines cannot work upside down due to missing lubrication during reverse flight. So, apart from any other important risk you never can reverse fly a commercial turbine aircraft. Comments are appreciated. Thanks
in a commercial airline would a barrel roll not mean all the dust, debris cigarette butts (this is Russia) etc swirl around and make a mess of the cockpit?
if executed correctly a barrel roll will never seed one and a half gs This is not a dangerous maneuver if performed correctly. Look at text Johnson performing a barrel roll in a 707 in front of Boeing executives. to perform this maneuver properly, you would’ve first pulled the nose up, slowing airspeed, You would’ve never brought the nose down at one point during the barrel roll and should’ve lost air speed.
About 30 barrel rolls are needed for Android to turn on a secret autopilot, that avoids a crash. Windows needs 20 fast dives that end up with crashes, after that the plane will be driven safely. The Russians may have done this deliberately to fix their autopilot, and to put it into another plane.
I’m sure these guys and the two knuckleheads who attempted to climb an empty CRJ to 45,000 feet would have a lot to talk about. Rule of thumb…just do what you are supposed to do and save the “fun” for an appropriate aircraft or the simulator.
I cannot think of any real world flight with passengers you would need to do a barrel roll so there is no reason at all for the Captain to try that maneuver! He is at fault and killed the crew with him!
A barrel roll done properly is no more dangerous than crossing the road, done at one g the aircraft rotates around its own axis and puts no extra strain on the airframe, what the Russians did was not a barrel roll at least it doesn’t sound like it, there’s no need to put the aircraft into dive, a barrel roll is done in level flight. Whole video is a bit misleading with no questions asked and none given!
