Snowbirds: Down but not out (but should they be?)
Problems with ejection system put Snowbirds on holdNot out:Members of Canada's Snowbirds perform at the Air Show during the Canadian National Exhibition, Monday September 1, 2008.
Photograph by: Peter J. Thompson, National Post
The Snowbirds, Canada’s iconic acrobatic flying team and the centrepiece of Canada Day celebrations in the nation’s capital, will be on the ground indefinitely.
A problem with the ejection-seat systems used in Snowbird jets prompted the Department of National Defence to implement an “operational pause,” it was announced Saturday [official news release here].
The air force could not say whether the jets would be in the air in time for Canada Day. If the planes don’t perform a flypast over the Parliament buildings next month, it will be only the second cancellation for the team in more than two decades. The Snowbirds didn’t perform in 1998 due to poor weather.
“We’re not sure how long it’s going to last,” said David Lavallee, an air force spokesman. “It will basically take as long as it needs to take to make sure that we assess the problem thoroughly and recommend courses of action to make sure that aircraft can be operated safely.”
The problem lies with the lapbelt system which is designed to disconnect should a pilot have to eject from the plane midflight.
The same system malfunctioned in May 2007, killing Capt. Shawn McCaughey during a practice flight in Montana. McCaughey was flying upside down when his safety belt became unlatched, causing him to fall from his seat out of reach of his controls. He could not eject or prevent the plane from crashing. However, Lavallee said the problem is not the same this time.
“I just want to underscore that this is not the same problem as has been identified with the lapbelt system in the past. It’s a different area of the system.”
The problem was discovered Friday as the Snowbirds were in Bagotville, Que. preparing for an air show.
Regular pre-flight procedures detected the malfunction while the planes were still on the ground. All flights were immediately put on hold. Lavallee said, however, that the Snowbirds have not been “grounded,” at least not technically. “A grounding is more serious,” he said. “An operational pause is a temporary cessation of flying operations.”
The air force’s directorate of flight safety is conducting an investigation. Until it is complete, the Snowbirds’ fleet of CT-114 Tutors will remain on the ground, Lavallee said.
The fleet is now considered obsolete but can be flown safely until 2020, according to the Canadian Forces.
A total of eight people have died as a result of Snowbird accidents, including seven pilots. The most recent fatal crash occurred last October when Capt. Bryan Mitchell and a photographer crashed in a farmer’s field, killing both.
The operational pause also affects seven other aircraft, including the Hawk One F-86 Sabre [and] a CT-133 flown by the National Research Council.
Spare parts could keep Snowbirds aloft until 2020Sure seems like fairly extreme jury-rigging to me. From a March 25 post also based on a Star story:
Old jets can still be flown despite failing systems, defence report says
RION SANDERS/AP FILE PHOTO
The cost of keeping the Snowbirds' aging Tutor jets in the air for a decade is estimated at $116 million. New aircraft could cost $30 million apiece, an unlikely expenditure given air force budget constraints.
The famed Snowbirds aerial fleet will be a shell of its former self if the government okays a proposal to extend the life of the aging jets by a decade, documents obtained by the Toronto Star reveal.The plan to keep the team's Tutor jets in the air means Canada's finest military pilots will be flying planes that are jury-rigged with equipment that has been salvaged in a repair shop or was never intended for use in the Tutor, a model last produced more than 40 years ago.
"It has been determined that the aircraft structure and engines are capable of being extended to the year 2020," says a defence department analysis of the CT-114 Tutors.
"As far as electronics and avionics are concerned, there are various systems that will become unsupportable every year from 2010 through to 2020," says the document, which was the basis for a recommendation that Defence Minister Peter MacKay approve extending the life of the planes through the next decade.
Part of the rationale is that the military could save money by avoiding the immediate purchase of a replacement fleet.
The briefing note for MacKay, dated October 2008, warns of "technical risks" if the extension to 2020 is authorized. A second option, which "mitigates the technical risks," is to purchase a new fleet of jets in 2015 [good luck on getting the money just for aerobatic planes]. After the Star first reported on the impending decision, a defence department spokesperson said that the risks are "to the program, not to the pilots."
The documents do cast doubt on an official request by the Snowbirds to air force leadership for repairs and upgrades, particularly to the planes' navigation and communications systems.
"What is perceived is that the upgrades requested would be nice to have (rather than) required. The same goes with the weather warning system. (The Snowbirds) mentioned that it would greatly enhance safety of flight, but does not having one actually put the pilots at risk?" the analysis asks.
That position seems to have softened more recently.
The air force plans to strip instruments that measure engine speed from decommissioned Hercules transport planes for use in the Tutor when its dials become "non-repairable" in 2010, according to the documents.
Other parts, including the Tutor's vertical speed indicator and a system that measures operational loads – described as "mission critical" – are no longer produced, and the air force has few replacements.
The total cost to keep the Tutor jets in the air until 2020 is estimated by the military at $116 million.
"The Tutor is a great aircraft," said Lt.-Col. Darryl Shyiak, the Snowbirds' lead pilot in 1997-98. "The best analogy I can give you is to a beautiful 1967 Corvette that's been meticulously maintained, that looks good and functions well as long as it's in good shape mechanically."
The military expects a decision on the future of the Snowbirds "before the summer," according to internal defence department emails.
There is a possibility that the fleet, a fan favourite at air shows across North America, will become the victim of federal budget cuts. An order to cut the air force's budget by 5 per cent prompted reports that the Snowbirds could be grounded.
Shyiak says it's better to have old, overhauled planes in the sky than to scrap the Snowbirds team because the air force can't afford up to $30 million for each replacement.
MacKay has said that while the Snowbirds are dear to Canadians, they are low on the list of priority purchases the military must make.
......whether it really is a good idea to keep the Tutors flying for another eleven years...
Extending service of the Tutors to 2020 is a "technically challenging" option but it would allow the Canadian Forces to select a plane that could serve double duty [emphasis added] with both the air force's pilot training program [currently the CT-155 Hawk] and the Snowbirds, providing a "significantly lower cost when compared against a new aircraft acquisition."
The last Tutor (then CL-41) for the Royal Canadian Air Force was built in 1966 [more here], so the youngest plane will be 54 years old in 2020...
posted by Mark, Ottawa at 1:08 p.m.
4 Comments:
I seem to recall reading that the CF mothballed a number of it's CF-18s for budgetary reasons. If that's the case, the obvious solution is to un-mothball some of these.
I'm guessing that $116 million figure quoted as needing to be spent to keep the geriatric Tutors flying would cover the costs of de-mothballing enough CF-18s to equip the Snowbirds.
For that amount or maybe even less, the Snowbirds would have a modern, very capable bird. (And, btw, the same aircraft that the US Navy Blue Angels aerobatics team uses.)
Any comment on this from someone knowledgeable about the CF-18s and/or mothballing/demothballing and related costs?
A moral question arises.
Should we be paying $116 megabucks for what is at the end of the day a -propaganda exercise- when our infantry does not have snowmobiles? (They don't!) When they don't have tanks? When neither the Army or the Navy have helicopters? When the Air Force doesn't have transport aircraft to transport the no-tanks and no-helicopters to where the guys are actually going? When we're in a shooting war?
I love air shows, and I love to watch the Snowbirds. But I don't love to watch them fly birds older than the pilots, held together with dedication, love, spit and bailing wire.
If they have to be flying jets, either give them operational CF-18 fighters off the flight line with a paint job, or shut it down.
But surely there's an aerobatic aircraft available for less than $30 million a piece in the world? We could probably give them Spitfires cheaper than that, and they'd cost less to maintain too.
Plus, we do still have an aircraft industry in this country despite the best efforts to kill it over the years. Bombardier can't build a single seat stunt plane on demand? Guys build them in their garages! WTF is that?
I think the department's intent is to bundle the purchase of a new aerobatic team aircraft in with the purchase of new jet trainers when that contract comes due in a few years. The idea is that the Snowbirds could be flying Hawks, or their successor, so at least there would be some commonality with another fleet in the CF instead of buying a one-off aerobatic plane that would be orphaned from a logistics standpoint.
The real problem here is that we can't build a time machine, go back a couple of decades, and plan and fund for equipment obsolescence as we go along. Instead we're stuck trying to scramble at the last minute for stuff - not just the Tutors, but a lot of equipment in all three elements - that we KNEW FOR A FACT was going to need replacing at some point.
BB, I came to the conclusion a loooong time ago that the Canadian establishment -hates- the Canadian military. Hates 'em. That's the real problem. Its been like that since the 1950s, Trudeau just accelerated the process.
The Snowbird's Tudor situation is -policy-, not incompetence. Powers within the political establishment of this country WANT kids driving vehicles that were obsolete and worn out when they were born.
What I find interesting is how well these people, these groups, have been able to hide all these years. I don't know who they are. I'm pretty sure I didn't ever vote for any of them, but they sure as hell seem to be able to get what they want out of the Libs, the PCs and now the CPC don't they?
That's why we keep hearing nonsense like this $30m each number. Major crock there. Yeah, $30 mill for an F-16/F-18, but I'm quite sure an entire aerobatic team could be fronted for a hell of a lot less than $30 million. There are -private- teams in the world, eh? How much do they spend? What do they fly? Do the Red Barons cost $30 mil a year? No way.
I think we should DEFINITELY have the Snowbirds. Their aircraft should be designed and built in Canada. Did you know the Americans are buying trainers from a company in London Ont.? They are. Diamond Aircraft.
http://www.diamondaircraft.com/index.php
Canada can't buy basic trainers from Diamond? They can't have a design contest for jet trainer/aerobatic planes? We can't have ground attack aircraft like the Warthog to back up the lads?
We can have all those things. We -used to have- all those things. Half the Spitfires and Lancasters ever made were made right f-ing here on Ontario.
I'd say some hard-shell anti-military types in Ottawa need to be shown the door, and some stimulus money needs to get spent creating an export industry in aircraft and vehicles to rival Boeing and Rockwell.
Or we could keep flying antiques until the losses get too ugly. That's the current plan.
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