78 Killed in Ukraine Airshow Disaster Once again, questions are raised about the safety of pushing tonnes of jet powered steel to their limits close to huge crowds. Having recently attended RIAT at Fairford I shudder to think what the casualty rate would have been if the same would of happened there. The last time something like this happened was at Ramstein, when the Freccie Tricolori (Italian version of the red arrows) piled into the crowd after a mid air collision. Since that incident all aircraft have to stay behind a "display line", usually the runway, so that the crowd are at less risk. It seemed to me that the SU-27 was heading towards the crowd when it lost power...did they not follow the warnings of Ramstein? Goodness only knows. What we do know is that 78 innocent people lost their lives perhaps without reason. I apologise for the tone of this post but I was nearly in tears at the news report.
They were celebrating 60 years of that particular squadron (or something) too, a waste of 78 lives and a waste of a damn good Sukhoi 27
Scares the crap out of you when your watching that and you have f-16's and Eurofighters at 200ft above your head! Farnborough airshow this weekend!!
it shouldn't have happened :cries: i really hope everyone learns the safety lesson this time - and the pilots must be feeling awful, even tho it did look like engine failure
both did apparently... tho it did look like it wasn't exactly a good landing for them... but both survived
The death toll has raised to 83. The Ukranian President has fired the Air Force Commander, and is out to punish those involved.
i think that's the point, Rich. Soviet built aircraft are reaching the point where their poor maintenance is making them dangerous.
has there ever been an airshow where there HASNT been a crash ? its very sad tho 78 kill, 112 injured, some critically sux big style
Looks as if the Pilots have been made the scapegoats in this case: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/2178539.stm
