This doesn't happen in real life.....

[Erik Johansson]

I totally agree with Erik and his comments under the heading, ‘TIH90 crash’ that there is too much time spent on aircraft crashes. That more people loose their lives in car accident than in air mishaps is a fact but it appears that being killed in twos or threes is now acceptable. And, of course, news about such ‘normal’ misfortunes does not sell evening papers. So, what about a bit of humour and fun in the forum? If this is not the way I am sure that Sven-Erik will delete my input very quickly.

My heading is ‘This doesn’t happen in real life’. You expect so see these kind of things in cartoons but…

I was flygtekniker in the Swedish Air Force and was stationed at a base where we still operated the old J29s. Several were already parked for good on the grass waiting for the final chop. The operations of the day were over and we had a short rest in our day room before pushing the old 29s into the hangars. The aircraft were old as so was the ground support equipment. To get the 29s into the hangars we used a short tow bar from the front of the jeep to the nose wheel. This way we pushed the 29s in backwards into the hangars. From daily and frequent use there was plenty of play both at the point where the tow bar was hooked up to the jeep and to the nose wheel. Consequently the nose wheel wobbled from left to right all the time and the driver of the jeep had a full time job to steer left or right to compensate for these movements of the nose wheel.

So, one day we received a brand new tow bar. Wonderful! The aircraft went as straight as if it was on rails and pushing the aircraft to its place in the hangar was now child’s play. One of my colleagues was a bit of a ‘show off’ and, having finished his fag, he told us to stay where we were and he would show us how to push a 29 into the hangar. It did not take long before he came passed the building at some considerable speed. Having passed the building there was a 90 degree turn and then some 50 meters to the hangar. My colleague managed the 90 degree turn very well and at about the same speed and with that he disappeared out of view. A second later there was an almighty thud. We all dashed out of the building to see what had happened. My friend had forgotten one small detail. Believe it or not but he had fail to remember to open the hangar doors. There was a rather sad looking 29 with the skin of the tail section similar to that of a raisin. Further more, the collision with the hangar door had made it jump off the rails and it was now leaning at a dangerous angle against the top of the hangar. In his panic my friend disengaged the jeep from the remains of the 29 and drove into the hangar through the back door. His idea was to slowly push the door up to a more vertical and safer position. He approached the door slowly but in the state he was he slipped on the clutch and rammed the door with some force. Luck was with him this time and the door actually jumped back on the rails.

To make a long story short, and after consultation with our ‘Flygplanmastare’ and ‘Forvaltare’ it was concluded that if we could report the full number of aircraft serviceable the next morning that would be the end of the story. A group of us worked all night removing the tail section from an already discarded 29s and with a bit of luck and a lot of hard work we could declare the 29 serviceable the following morning.

Anyone else out there who has experienced anything similar?

[Lars Sundin]

I see some similarities with another more expensive mishap, described on http://www.mach-flyg.com/utg77/77se-lsf.htm I do not know (or remember) how it came to happen.

Lars S

[Bengt Ekbladh]

Kan inte lägga ut bilder, men på s 114 i Flyghistorisk Revy 29 ser o läser man::

>>21A-3 nr. 21301 ur F6 den 21/11 1951.
Vid avsedd förflyttning av fpl. för egen motor till annan uppställningsplats för motorprov har föraren (chefsmek) för länge ägnat sin uppmärksamhet åt ett felaktigt reglage o inte observerat, förrän i ett för sent skede , att fpl. till följd av kraftig medvind kommit för Nära hangarporten.
Obs den hängande kulsprutekameran >> 2 talande bilder

Kostnaden uppskattades till 155:-

Bengt

[Bengt Ekbladh]

>>Kostnaden uppskattades till 155:->>

Utgår från att detta gällde 21301:an
Hangarports reparationskostnad torde tillkomma!
Mina uppgifter säger inte Var incidenten hände, men troligast är väl Karlsborg?
Bengt