U.S. NAVY AIRCRAFT CARRIER LANDING MISHAPS & CRASHES Training Film 9002 

My Dad was one of these incredibly brave and supremely skilled individuals. When he retired,he'd logged over 18,000 hours and 900 plus arrested landings. He left our world at the age of 84...He's still up there and I can only imagine what he sees and experiences. Fair winds and following seas,Dad. I love you.

''Official use only'' means I'm a fighter pilot now, woo hoo!

Early in my career in aircraft carrier operations, I concentrated on speed control. My entire career in aircraft operations. I remained accident free. I flew day fighters in WW11, night attack in Korea, Transport on my final tour.

I am a Plankowner on the TR CVN-71 and on our first med cruise we had an arresting cable failure. It hit a parked Sea King helo and damn near cut it in half. The only thing preventing complete separation was the engine shafts. There was four Red Shirts in the crash crane that are the luckiest four men on earth. The cable passed about two feet over their heads. We had one barricade arrest because the landing gear on the Tomcat would not fully deploy. But that was it.

US Navy, 72-76 AE2. I wanted to take this opportunity to say something to the actual Pilot audience here. We really had a lot of respect for you guys, you were the ones who put their personal posterior on the line, and this was deeply appreciated. Just wanted to let you know what your enlisted teammates were often thinking. thx guys.

For years I filmed the flight deck of USS Saratoga CV-60. Landing gear collapses, hung ordnance coming off and bouncing down the flight deck, or into the forward bow striking sailors working on planes. I have seen and filmed flight deck crew who for just a moment quit paying attention and get run over and killed, or forget never to walk through a prop ark and walk right into an E-2 Hawkeyes prop. In Desert Storm we wore the non skid off the deck, and planes literally slid into each other like they were sliding on ice...smash and crash. I even filmed "Tilly" our aircraft crane, going overboard in the North Atlantic in heavy seas...tiedowns broke and she just rolled across the deck and over the side. After years behind the Camara and on the flight deck, I can tell you all...it is an easy place to die. But I can also tell you it was the most exciting part of my life. Helicopters going in the water, men blown overboard during a JBD malfunction, crew falling off planes, too fires and 500 pound bombs falling and rolling across the deck. I can only say, that to live it and experience it....and come out alive is a great feeling....IC United States Navy Ret.

My father was a career Air Force Command pilot. His respect for our naval aviators remained immense throughout his life. This film brings home to me why he felt this way.

A few years ago I had the privilege of meeting Melvin Brantley, the gentleman that replied on here about being a pilot thru 3 wars. I met him at a showing of the movie Dunkirk in the Ft. Lauderdale area. He was kind, humble with a twinkle in his eyes. He watched the movie from his wheelchair, by himself. I had the feeling that he must of been a pilot so after the movie I went down to chat with him. It's something that I'll never forget. I wanted so badly to offer to buy him dinner so that I could hear more of his stories. He'd already been generous with his time and I didn't want to monopolize any more of his time. BTW, the final tour he is speaking of, as you probably guessed was Viet Nam. To the "gentleman" that was insulting him, with all due respect, neither of us is worthy of washing a true hero's jock strap. That man managed to survive 3 wars - as a pilot!!! Just goes to show the difference between the greatest generation, and today's younger punks. (Not saying all young are punks, clearly not the case.)

My late friend served safely on carrier flight decks in 1958-59 and often remarked it was without question the world's most dangerous workplace. Night landings scared the bejesus out of everyone as 7 tons of screeching metal whizzed by their faces. There were accidents and men died. But crews did their jobs then and do so today, beautifully. God bless 'em all!

A close friend spent seven years on carrier decks without a scratch. A few years after getting out, he was killed out at Glamis by drunk teens in a 4x4 running him over. That was in '99, and it seems like yesterday. He's been at Ft Rosecrans Cemetery since. We miss him very much.

“I never did anything in space that was more difficult than a night carrier landing. I think we sometimes get credit for more heroism than we deserve.” Alan Bean, Apollo 12, Skylab 3.

Wow, this film took me back "a few years". As a veteran of the A7E, both as a Fleet Pilot and later as a RAG instructor...I remember these films. In fact, the first time I saw one was the day before my first jet carrier qual in the TA4J. Of course all of us watching knew it would not be any of us buying the farm the next day landing on the USS Lexington. Thanks for posting this!

Cool video. I love watching old training films. A history lesson loaded in each and every one !

Great fun to watch these guys do what they do. My father was an Air Force pilot from way back, like WWII. I think I have airplane fluid in my veins! I love watching these guys do what they do in such dangerous conditions. True professionals!

My dad was on the USS Ticonderoga CVA-14 in the 50’s and USS Bon Homme Richard CVA-31 in the 60’s. He was a pilot but his job was in Combat Information Center (CIC). In his Navy career he started flying prop and retired flying jets.

Fascinating. I love these USN/USAF RAF/RN safety/instruction films. A lot of common sense advice...but in these high pressure situations, it's often hard to remember even the basics. These films have saved many lives, even though they sound cheesy and corny to us today.

This really brings back memories, especially the aircraft of that era. Makes me feel as though I'm back on the deck.

That brings back a lot of memories. I must have watched this video a couple dozen times over my career. Even after finishing flight training in the early ‘80’s, every squadron seemed to play it multiple times during each cruise. Fun times.

14:52 "Believe in the meatball". No truer words have ever been spoken.

I got to spend a couple of years recording flight ops, best job I’ve ever had.

Thanks for the video. I got to see a lot of my old fighter squadron on the deck VF-211 tail designator NJ. It wasn't on the ship I was on (USS Hancock CVA19 or USS Bonn Hom Richard CVA31) But I did see one accident on the film that had to have been on my ship & that was a F8 that hit so hard on the nose wheel that it broke it off. It then skidded down the deck & the engine was ingesting parts of its intake & the deck. That destroyed the engine & we had to send that plane back to the USA for parts. I worked on the flight deck as a plane captain maintaining my assigned plane, & then was transferred into the jet engine repair shop. (I had been to the jet engine school but they want you on the flight deck for a while before you are able to work on them) A very dangerous job being on the flight deck, I have seen people die there.

Got to spend 4 days on a Essex class carrier when I was 13. Norfolk to mayport on the Franklin D Roosevelt CV 42. Last run before retirement. My dad got to come home early with 7 chiefs and got 40 boys to meet the ship before she left Norfolk. The Nimitz was there. No A-4’s. There were A-8’s I was given a camera snd shot rolls of film for a few days for Mr. Chapman who was the ship’s photographer and family friend. It was an incredible experience.

Much respect to these professional's..things dont always go to plan..

I'm not a pilot but have always admire aircraft and their pilots. Aircraft carrier's have especially been another interest. I live near the USS Hornet and while I'm an Air Force Vet, I enjoy touring the Hornet frequently. Thanks for sharing this video.

My dad talked about flight ops in high seas north of the Arctic Circle in the Fall of 1958 on CVA-42. They were launching AD-6’s through waves crashing over the flight deck. The carrier was pitching and rolling so much that normal aircraft recovery could not be done. The pilots would get their spads over the flight deck, cut the power and let the deck come up and catch the plane. Over 60% of VA-175’s AD-6’s were damaged beyond repair. The Squad was disbanded when they got back to Jacksonville NAS. They were doing search and recovery operations looking for an AWAX type plane that went down near the North Pole. The .gov did not want the Soviets to find it. From my dad, I learned there is no better pilot in the world than a Navy Aviator! He was absolutely correct about that.

Gotta love the narration on these 50's/60's educational films. "Billy knows what to do in the event of an atomic explosion, don't ya Billy? That's right. Duck and cover."

Great tips. Just in case I find myself on a carrier and need to save the world.

As an Air Force pilot my dad always said the AF pilots were the best, but he said that carrier landings were no joke and took nerves of steel.

A few times I would sneek up to a catwalk above the fantail and just below the flight deck and watch planes land at night. Looked like they were coming right at you lol Navy Vietnam Vet, USS Enterprise.

Man that guy is a legend. Loved his interview in 'In the Shadow Of The Moon.'

Thanks for having that countdown display that covers up what this video is supposed to be teaching.

One of the things that always amazes me is how the tail hook can take the sudden stress of landing and not get yanked right off the fuselage.

When I was on the USS Forrestal (CVA-59) in the early 70's, I saw 2 accidents. One landing and one on takeoff. The landing -- the pilot came in, hit the arresting gear, which snapped and he spun all the way down the flight deck spilling JP-5 all over the place. On takeoff - we were going from Naples to Athens and conducting flight ops on the way. An F-4 Phantom took off, climbed to about 10K feet and exploded. All that was found was the pilot's helmut and the left wing tip.

Interesting....Thank you for posting this. Much appreciated.

Love these old safety videos

I have a new level of respect for our Navy pilots. They are amazing.

As interesting as the film is the best part is reading all the stories in the comments section from former pilots and flight deck crew going as far back as WWII.

Really cool vintage film. thanks for posting.

These periscope videos are endlessly interesting.

A7's and F4 , that's my era! I always remember a safety tip,if you dont see the pilot in a A-7,You are too close!!

Honesty hurts to be admitted, but makes you STRONGER.

Army guy here. I have nothing but respect for Naval Aviators and the whole carrier crew.

Thank You for sharing

This helped with my NES Top Gun game, thanks.

I sit at a desk all day every day programming on a computer. The biggest "fear" I have is spilling coffee on my phone or getting a door ding on my new car. I don't have to wonder if I'm going to hit an updraft and land cockeyed on a pitching carrier. I bow with humility to those of you that take these risks every fvcking day to keep this country safe. Thank you!

You have to admire every single pilot from pre WWI through WWII, Korean War, Vietnam and up to todays carrier pilots, the experiences and technological advances made during war and peace could only have come to fruition because of these pilots, and the world would be far less secure without today’s carrier groups who project naval military power throughout the world. Carrier pilots are by necessity the best of the best, highly intelligent and not a little crazy, and the way this video is narrated it makes them sound like a group of numb skulls, yes I know it is a training film. Thanks for sharing, thumbs up 👍.

Thx for the vid, really makes me a better carrier pilot

F-8 Crusaders, we had those when I was serving aboard the USS Shangri-La CVA38, Essex Class Carrier back in the 60's. We also carried A-4 Sky raiders, I was a tilly, the guy who guided the plane on to the catapult.

That was a great vid, now I've just gotta get me a plane and one of those ships

nice video!

This stuff is great.thanks for sharing it.

My father flew off of jeep carriers in WW2. He once told me there was a pilot who was waved off 12 times . On the 13th try he made it then the TBF ran out of fuel. He said the the whole crew of the ship never let him forget about it.

"Eject while you still have control." A-3D crew with no ejection seats: "Uh, we have questions..."

That was very interesting, thanks.

INCREDIBLE! So many mishaps can happen . . . . and deck crew must be very well-trained also or can have disastrous results. Very stressful, indeed! Thanks for posting . . . .

It's interesting when carrier guys try to make landings on regular airfields after a long time at sea.

Hundreds of us who watched this have the term "Meatball-Airspeed-Line up" etched into the back of our brains. My experiences began in props with LSOs, flat-passes and no mirrors. All of the later improvements just removed a lot of the fun in making approaches. These take-offs and landings were the magic wiffledust of our careers and today, sixty years later, they rank on the top rung of my fun/excitement ladder. Every one of us has had friends perish as a result of incidents similar to those shown here. Bad judgment, equipment failure…nothing new. But what a great life! I had one of the launch problems when launched into a pack of parked aircraft at night. My 0.1 logged flight with a water landing.

Great videy

Usefull lesson video for DCS world pilots

We had an interesting accident on CV-19 in 1975. Two A-4Fs from VA-212 collided when when the tail of the lower aircraft slammed into the nose landing gear door of the aircraft above. About a third of the vertical stabilizer and half of the rudder was gone, with wiring for the Charger Blue mod that was on the top of the tail hanging out. The bird with no available nose gear bingoed to the beach at NAS Cubi Point, Republic of the Philippines, while the bird with virtually no rudder landed on the boat. Talk about brass!

It never occurred to me that they would rarely deal with crosswinds. This was VERY interesting. Made me wish I had been a carrier pilot.

Very good presentation. As an Army Aviation Safety officer having attended to Aviation Safety Officer course at the Institute of Aerospace Safety and Management at the University of Southern California, I can attest that the goal of Aviation Safety is a "0" accident rate. To achieve this we need to investigate situations and train for them. As you stated, there is a chain of events at play in every instance and breaking just one link could, and probably should, prevent what occurred.

I was a Navy PR aircrew survival technician back in the early 70s. Navy and Marine pilots in those days crashed regularly. We took care of all of the aircrew Survival equipment from liquid oxygen for breathing to the parachute on the ejection seat to the risk kit with all the equipment they ejected out of the airplane with When I was on the parachute deck for two years we had 12 young men use their ejection seats and parachutes successfully.

I remember some of the most dangerous conditions were when it was damp from light mist combined with JP5 residue on the flight deck. Even with brand new nonskid on the deck it was like trying to walk on ice. Seen an F14 literally slide sideways into a catwalk while taxiing to one of the bow cats. The ship made a sudden and unannounced turn, gear broke traction and that was all she wrote.

22:23 Smoothest WAVE OFF ever!!! 😁😁😁😁

bless that pilots soul, that actually made my heart race.

When I was in the Navy I would watch the deck guys issues directions to the taxing planes at night and during storms. These pilots were actually hanging out over the deck as they completed there turns to park. I couldn’t believe how brave they were. Can you imagine going downhill on a rolling deck, on a wet deck and being over the water at night. Remember, the cockpit is in front of the nose gear. Brave, brave men.

Well, accidents are tragic, especially when lives and multi-million-dollar aircraft are lost, but I know they film everything and they DO use these film clips to teach others what NOT to do! (We also know pilot ejection isn't always fast enough, and ejection can leave you bruised and hurt, and that's before you hit the water at maybe 150 mph! if you're fast enough, otherwise you must eject underwater and hope the canopy goes off so you can eject your seat!) Aircraft carrier take-off and landing procedures are some of the most dangerous in the military service, not only to the pilots but the deck hands as well. Safe landings, pilots and personnel! And THANK YOU ALL for your service!

Some of the emergency procedures are out dated but at the same time those aircraft in the video are now in bone yards or in a museum somewhere. Its no joke on carrier operations, its a rush working on the flight deck but also very dangerous.

so many memories of having to watch many of these movies

Great video, I am confident after watching this video, sure makes it sound pretty easy, I think I can do it.

As a former Navy guy, the biggest mishaps happened in the galley. Thank God for Tabasco sauce. Jokes aside, splashing down in front of a carrier strapped into an aircraft, pfew, not for me.

"The Final Countdown" immediately comes to mind watching this😎

Was on the Midway years ago and can not imagine landing anything that was fast on it. Also - after take off they move the airfield. maybe I could never find it again anyhow! Lots of respect for those who can ever fly to and land on a carrier deck.

Very cool video. Go Ivory Flakes!

"For Official Use Only"! Uh oh, now I'm in trouble!

8:17 "and uses another aircraft for an expensive chock" 😂

Very interesting

My friend refueled fighter jets back in 1978. He saw a bad accident on the carrier where a helicopter turned over and cut a guy in half. He cleaned up the deck after the accident.

As an ex navy man you'd be surprised how much crazy stuff happens on a flight deck. It'll snatch your soul in seconds

While I was onboard the USS Midway we did lose some aircraft. A rear strut collapsed on an A-3 Whale... Had to catch an RF-4 in the barricade as it's nose wheel wouldn't come down.. Lost two A-7's on the cat. Had an A-7 and an F-4 take a ramp strike. The Phantoms were a beast. They always seemed to land hard. My favorites were the attack aircraft. (A-7 and A-6) The A-6 seemed so graceful and I loved the cannon on the A-7. It sounded like ripping metal when it let loose.. I miss those days..

I was a PLAT (Pilot Landing Aid Television) maintainer/operator in V-2 division VLA (Visual Landing Aids) aboard USS Independence (CV62) in '71/'72. I can tell you that it was one of the more exciting jobs I've ever had. The most treacherous aspect was going up on the flight deck during flight ops to clean the JP5 fuel spray off the centerline deck-mounted camera's rectangular periscope "tophat" lens so we could make watchable video for the flight crews. The compressed air cleaner that was supposed to do the job was never functional, or effective, so we always had to clean it manually, and in a big hurry, too. You haven't lived until you've made that sprint in near total darkness from the port catwalk up onto the flight deck, to the centerline and back, running on a slick-as-ice flight deck covered in jet fuel, especially at night (when it always seemed to be this E-4's turn). High pucker factor and always very dangerous job. I continually feared two things - being sucked into an A-7 intake (saw the aftermath once), or being blown over the side, especially in the North Atlantic, where exposure time was about 5 minutes, on a good night, assuming you survived that 85 ft., or thereabouts, fall into the drink. Mucho respect for my V-2 ABM and ABF brethren who were ALWAYS up there on the flight deck. They were truly a rare (read: wild) breed. Heroes one and all, in my book. At least they gave our VLA crew of five a couple flight skins to share, come pay day. Good times! By the way, our accident and any fatality incident videotapes were always sent to AIRLANT for accident investigation, and very rarely, if ever, was there any public release.

I'm proud to say I served aboard this iconic US Ship during dresert Storm, and have memories I will cherish for a lifetime!

My dad trained in East Washington State for carrier pilot ww2 ,, After graduation his squadron flew down the Columbia River under every Bridge there at the time to his Carrier anchored in Astoria where he promply, crashed on the deck , LOL ,, He went on to ace at 5 planes

Well, if I ever try to land on a throw rug, I'll have an idea what to do.

Thanks for the answer :)

Dangerous job

Lloyds of London said the most dangerous workplace in the world is a carrier flight deck; I believe it. From a former USAF type, nothing but respect for carrier crews and aviators.

So how can I utilize this information on flying RC planes.. ... "" I am the meatball"" ....

Thanks for the stories. I worked on E2Cs during the early mid 70's on Saratoga. ....and you said it best...."it's an easy place to die" having survived three cruises. At least 5 known incidents, three near fatal....all potentially deadly. Looking back..... I'd do it again.....but from a new point of view.

VAQ-134 Garudas, 1981-1985. Plane captain and ADAN. Loved my job.

The same guy narrates every film like this. Plus news reels and training films, it’s the same dude.

"The Box" too slow to fly, too fast to stop...

I followed what this guy said in war thunder I grinded from planes two jets in less than an hour!!!!!!! Amazing

man.... what a dangerous job...for all involved

Thank God, I finally know how to make a carrier landing....Fly The Meatball, Fly The Meatball !!!

Tornado pilot- "shes throwing sparks!" F14 pilot-"They all do, and my Tomcat only has the winders on!" GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO NAVY!

As I've posted elsewhere, the three man Douglas A3-D tanker, at 25:09, is good example of why this bird, when in trouble, referred to as 'All Three Dead.' Amen to that.

when did you do that?

Good luck ejecting from that A3D "Whale" at 5:44. The only way to effect an emergency egress from the A3D SkyWarrior was via a tunnel that the 3-man aircrew had to slide down which lead to a hatch on the underside of the aircraft. The aircraft was essentially a death trap in the event of a carrier landing/launch mishap, which is why, with typical gallows humour, aircrews joked that the BuAer designation "A3D" was said to stand for "All Three Dead".