F-22 Chainsaw Massacre

Pardon the pun in the title
A pilot of the 27th Fighter Squadron, USAF, became trapped in the cockpit of his F-22 on the ground on April 10th and had to be cut free by a fire crew with chainsaws!.

The canopy got stuck in the down and locked position and could not be opened manually after the pilot cycled the mechanism several times following a pre flight warning that it was unlocked, the crew were called in to cut him free after he had been trapped for 5 hours.

The repair costs have been estimated at around $180k to replace the transparency and to clean out the interior which became contaminated by oil from the chainsaws and shards of polycarbonate from the canopy




[edit on 24-4-2006 by waynos]

Originally posted by waynos
The repair costs have been estimated at around $180k to replace the transparency and to clean out the interior which became contaminated by oil from the chainsaws and shards of polycarbonate from the canopy

$180,000...just to replace a canopy???

Thats steep...very steep...just goes to show why modern day aircraft cost so much to build!


Mic

Same pics, much better quality HERE.

I wonder whether there will be additional costs in addition to the $182k, judging from the mess inside the cockpit... Not to speak of a major canopy inquiry...

Also, when looking at the last pic, the right-hand console looks odd, as if something has been removed from there, be it protection or secrecy.

The canopy wouldn’t open?!?! OMG!! The plane is garbage, it will clearly be owned by every other plane in the sky. Imagine a mechanical issue on a brand new plane barely in service a few months, the nerve. We all know that every other plane ever deployed in all of human history was absolutely perfect out of the box and never experienced any issues. What a waste of money the F-22 is, canopy cant even open. I say we trash the program over this and start from scratch. We should just buy Eurofighters, yeah, that’s it, and they are the best anyways, right?

OK, now back to reality:

Who cares? The only reason this is news is because the program is expensive. From and engineering point of view this is nothing, a non-issue. They will look at it, determine if it’s a design flaw or just a simple malfunction on that singular plane and move on. Not even news worthy, let alone contemplated. How many other plane manufacturers have a vested interest in the Raptor getting as much “negative” publicity as possible? All of them perhaps? This is just another example of non news being pumped up by agenda driven entities for nothing but self serving propaganda.

Did you read the tone of the article? First, look at the name of the source: Project On Government Oversight. Tell me that doesn’t say “agenda” all over it. And check this quote out: “…the cost of canopy replacement will run $182,205. (But after tens of billions of dollars, what's another $182,205?)…”

And of course they offer additional information on the Raptor: “Oh, and if you haven't read it yet check out Ed Offley's Raptor piece on the Nieman Watchdog” which if you go to the link they provide its all about how terrible the plane is.

Yeah, that’s fair and balanced…

Originally posted by skippytjc
The canopy wouldn’t open?!?! OMG!! The plane is garbage, it will clearly be owned by every other plane in the sky. Imagine a mechanical issue on a brand new plane barely in service a few months, the nerve. We all know that every other plane ever deployed in all of human history was absolutely perfect out of the box and never experienced any issues. What a waste of money the F-22 is, canopy cant even open. I say we trash the program over this and start from scratch. We should just buy Eurofighters, yeah, that’s it, and they are the best anyways, right?

How about relaxing a bit, hmm? Noone, neither in this thread so far nor from the linked blog (which I linked PRECISELY for the pics and not the text), came to the conclusions you are implying. Someone wrote to "scrap the F-22" in the comments, that is just a personal view.

Who cares? The only reason this is news is because the program is expensive. From and engineering point of view this is nothing, a non-issue. They will look at it, determine if it’s a design flaw or just a simple malfunction on that singular plane and move on. Not even news worthy, let alone contemplated. How many other plane manufacturers have a vested interest in the Raptor getting as much “negative” publicity as possible? All of them perhaps? This is just another example of non news being pumped up by agenda driven entities for nothing but self serving propaganda.

It is not agenda driven and Propaganda, it is a simple news bit that is HILARIOUS. The 30 years old door of my house opens and closes without a flaw. My 15 years old washing machine door opens and closes (electrically) without a flaw. My cheap microwave oven opens and closes without a flaw (again electrically). When an XXX million $ high-tech piece of kit fails to perform an extremely rudimentary function, this is funny, and thus gets reported (apart from all the other implications and discussions running). Again, relax.

Did you read the tone of the article? First, look at the name of the source: Project On Government Oversight. Tell me that doesn’t say “agenda” all over it.

And? Does this in any way affect the validity of the photos?

And check this quote out: “…the cost of canopy replacement will run $182,205. (But after tens of billions of dollars, what's another $182,205?)…”

Ever heard of sarcasm? Again, a funny event like this will of course spark mocking. Apart from that, 180k INDEED is an impressive sum, but is dwarfed compared to the overall program cost.

And of course they offer additional information on the Raptor: “Oh, and if you haven't read it yet check out Ed Offley's Raptor piece on the Nieman Watchdog” which if you go to the link they provide its all about how terrible the plane is.

Again, this doesnt change the ORIGINAL issue of a failing canopy on a multimillion $ plane. The article itself doesnt jump to conclusions, and apart from the justified sarcastic remark towards the cost there is also no other analysis of the event.

Yeah, that’s fair and balanced…

Of course it isnt. It is a BLOG. Opinions are the reason why blogs even exist. There, have another blog with the pics, this time in Russian so noone can read the text now. Do the pics or the event now look in any way different to you?

[edit on 24/4/2006 by Lonestar24]

Ah, that does look pretty bad, especially since it s such a pretty bird to damage but things happen as our good buddy Murphy once said. Love the title by the way.

Thank you for that post Waynos... I will use it in the near future...

There ya go seeker of... That's what I mean with expirience in the field... So it's not combat, but still... That shouldn't happend...

180 000 $ Sure it's a lot, but still everydaily, I remeber when one of our pilots messed up the landing gear in one of our F/A-18... it's going cost 200 000 € to fix that... That was our whole defense budget...

w00t, Red-Arrows are coming to Finland... Finally I will see if they are as good as Waynos has bragged...

I was just thinking...

If the canopy wouldnt open on the ground...would it have opened in an emergency?

When a pilot needs to eject the last thing they need is their canopy sticking...
Could have been alot worse!!!



Oh and...

Originally posted by Figher Master FIN
w00t, Red-Arrows are coming to Finland... Finally I will see if they are as good as Waynos has bragged...

They are...

Now thats a lot of money for that kind of damage. They are doing the same mistake that the Germans did in ww2 .

Originally posted by Lonestar24
It is not agenda driven and Propaganda, it is a simple news bit that is HILARIOUS. The 30 years old door of my house opens and closes without a flaw. My 15 years old washing machine door opens and closes (electrically) without a flaw. My cheap microwave oven opens and closes without a flaw (again electrically). When an XXX million $ high-tech piece of kit fails to perform an extremely rudimentary function, this is funny, and thus gets reported (apart from all the other implications and discussions running). Again, relax.

I'm sure that your washing machine or microwave isn't built to handle over 9 G's. I wonder why they didn't just jettison the canopy? As far as using chainsaws to open it, that's hilarious. Somebody just wasn't thinking. The pilor was in no immediate danger and they had five hours to figure something out and chainsaws was the best that they could come up with?

I have made several posts critical of the F-22 and I stand by what I have said, but to have this incident be used as a reason to attack the F-22 program is absurd. This is just a case of someone grandstanding and trying to attract attention. As far as the $188,000 goes, look into what it costs to keep the Congressional Barbershop open.

I now know how to beat every F-22 in the inventory...


nick all the WD-40 from the airbase



*If they don't have WD-40 in the US and elsewhere its spray on oil = genius invention

I could go out and buy a $14,000 Hyundai and never have any issue’s the entire time I own the car. But, on the flip side I can buy a $120,000 Mercedes and have dozens of issue’s throughout my ownership of the car. Does that mean the Hyundai is a better car? Does that mean that ALL MERCEDES are garbage? Does a Hyundai drive the same way as that Mercedes as a result?

Why is this story news again? Its not, it’s a nothing story about a nothing issue.

Let me describe this story in a different way:

A single, brand new, just a few months off the assembly line F-22 Raptor had canopy troubles. Instead of leaving the pilot in there longer than they needed while they figured it out, they chose to cut the canopy to let the pilot out. Because spare parts for this FLEDGLING JUST STARING PROGRAM aren’t readily available yet, repairs will cost $180,000. Engineer’s will determine if this is an isolated case and react accordingly. Story over.

Add that to the 100’s of issues every plane in all of existence has ever had. Please, name one plane of any kind that didn’t have bugs to be worked out.


F-22, best plane in the world, one instance of a bugged canopy or not.

Originally posted by skippytjc
I could go out and buy a $14,000 Hyundai and never have any issue’s the entire time I own the car. But, on the flip side I can buy a $120,000 Mercedes and have dozens of issue’s throughout my ownership of the car. Does that mean the Hyundai is a better car? Does that mean that ALL MERCEDES are garbage? Does a Hyundai drive the same way as that Mercedes as a result?

Why is this story news again? Its not, it’s a nothing story about a nothing issue.

Let me describe this story in a different way:


A single, brand new, just a few months off the assembly line F-22 Raptor had canopy troubles. Instead of leaving the pilot in there longer than they needed while they figured it out, they chose to cut the canopy to let the pilot out. Because spare parts for this FLEDGLING JUST STARING PROGRAM aren’t readily available yet, repairs will cost $180,000. Engineer’s will determine if this is an isolated case and react accordingly. Story over.

Add that to the 100’s of issues every plane in all of existence has ever had. Please, name one plane of any kind that didn’t have bugs to be worked out.


F-22, best plane in the world, one instance of a bugged canopy or not.

Well tell the same story to the germans .


[edit on 24-4-2006 by Russian Boy]

Originally posted by skippytjc
Add that to the 100’s of issues every plane in all of existence has ever had. Please, name one plane of any kind that didn’t have bugs to be worked out.

The Sea King helicopters that I worked on in the Navy in the 1980's were over 25 years old on average and we were still working bugs out of them. I still wouldn't have liked to have been in that Raptor with it on fire and the canopy jammed. I know that the pilot could have probably ejected through the canopy but I wouldn't have liked to be the first to test that system. Bugs being what they are you know.

Good god skippy, are you paranoid or something?

There is no bias AT ALL in my original post. go on, find some, I dare you

I reported this because it is a funny incident, thats all, an incident, it is not, and I do not claim it to be, indicative of any inherent defect or otherwise on the Raptor as a whole. If you have seen my other posts on the Raptor you would knoew that I rate it the best in the world, so why the OTT outburst

One reason that makes it funnier is that this is NOT a prototype during a test programme, but a service fighter and a regular pilot stuck in it.

Bearing in mind how infuriating you found this I looked on the thread about the Typhoon landing with its nose gear still retracted to see how annoying you found that. Ooh, guess what I found?

Get some perspective man.

The same thing has happened a few times to Tornado A/C and they have been in service since the 80's ! In the Tornado's case all you had to do was trip a certain C/B and you could keep somebody in there for hours.

If there was a genuine problem, which usually was an electrical fault, and you had to get the crew out due to extreme temperatures in the cockpit you can manually eject the canopy only from the ground.

All modern A/C will have this ability as the firecrews will need to get in the cockpit in an emergency and blowing off the canopy is the quikest way to do it...all the pilot does is put down his visor ( if he can ) and the ground crew will blow the canopy off.

All A/C have teething troubles or faults......even those that have been in service for years!

Sv....Out!

The same thing has happened a few times to Tornado A/C and they have been in service since the 80's ! In the Tornado's case all you had to do was trip a certain C/B and you could keep somebody in there for hours.

If there was a genuine problem, which usually was an electrical fault, and you had to get the crew out due to extreme temperatures in the cockpit you can manually eject the canopy only from the ground.

All modern A/C will have this ability as the firecrews will need to get in the cockpit in an emergency and blowing off the canopy is the quikest way to do it...all the pilot does is put down his visor ( if he can ) and the ground crew will blow the canopy off.

All A/C have teething troubles or faults......even those that have been in service for years!

Sv....Out!

On the other thread that Lonestar linked to (but only for the pictures skippy) a few people asked why he didn't just eject. Several theories were put forward but one thing nobody mentioned was that it wasn't actually an emergency and the rocket of the ejector seat would have needlessly destroyed the cockpit, I reckon that is the reason they opted to cut him out.

180k for just the canopy!??!????????????!?!?!!?!?!?

Hmm, maybe they should just fly without a canopy...whats the worse that could happen? I mean, everybody likes a convertable, right!?

Originally posted by MickeyDee
I was just thinking...

If the canopy wouldnt open on the ground...would it have opened in an emergency?

When a pilot needs to eject the last thing they need is their canopy sticking...
Could have been alot worse!!! ...

When the canopy is jettisoned, this is done via small rocket motors/explosive charges (dont know the exact way on the F-22). These could be strong enough to yank the canopy out of every normal mechanical lock. Additionally, the modern ejection seats are constructed to penetrate the canopy even when it is closed. Might be a very dangerous thing, but still the seat would leave the plane.

Originally posted by JIMC5499
... As far as using chainsaws to open it, that's hilarious. Somebody just wasn't thinking. The pilor was in no immediate danger and they had five hours to figure something out and chainsaws was the best that they could come up with? ...

Hmm, when there is a major failure of the canopy lock, there simply might be no other way than to destroy it. I´d say that the 5 hours they left him in there indeed is a sign that they tried any else possibility first.

Originally posted by Russian Boy

Well tell the same story to the germans .

What are you getting at? You mentioned the Germans two times now, what do they have to do with F-22?

-----------


Skippy:

No, when the Mercedes fails and the Hyundai doesnt, that says nothing about the overall cars. But what do you think is the more extraordinary (and unexpected) event? The $14k budget car or the $120k Mercedes? Of course, the faulty Mercedes. Now multiply this unusual faulty $120k car with 1500= $180 million, the price of the F-22. The more expensive a product is, the less acceptable a failure becomes. Add in the usual "F-22 is teh Shiznit" evaluation and you have a bigger case for interest.

This story is "news" because it makes people THINK and DISCUSS. I have seen this posted on several message boards, and sorry, a cumulated hundreds of posts IS proof that this is a newsworthy event, regardless of how YOU judge it.

And by the way, a destroyed canopy is a destroyed canopy is a destroyed canopy. It doesnt matter whether there is a full warehouse of spare parts available or whether the airplane is new or not. If this accident costs $180k now it will also cost around $180k in 1 year or in 10 years.

I´m not in the mood to repeat myself or what waynos wrote, but STILL noone even HINTED that this is an inherent design flaw of the F-22. The only one who is making a larger issue out of it and sees the liberal jewish pinko-commie propaganda here is YOU. Can we just stop it there?

[edit on 24/4/2006 by Lonestar24]