quote:

Originally posted by Loswsmith:
Everyone wants to have a person to point at and say "if it weren't for YOU this wouldn't have happened!" But with this sort of thing, there is generally not any way to do that. Fighters getting lost of carriers have been a part of carrier ops from day one in the 1920s to today. Planes break, waves move the ship, wind moves the plane, parts don't work right, parts break, pilots misjudge, deck hands foul up, etc. and is many different combinations in an operation where milliseconds matter. The key is, if you want planes going off carriers, sometimes you are going to lose a plane. And oftentimes you lose pilots. People die in accidents on carriers all the time. Want that to stop? Park the carriers. Otherwise do the absolute best you can with what you have and make sure that when the pilots go off the carrier its for a good reason.

quote:

Originally posted by 92fstech:

quote:

Originally posted by Rey HRH:
But here's the thing. that landing strip is angled out. As they're about to land, I think they're suppose to power up, they have two wires for two chances to catch, and if they fail to hook up, they're suppose to take off again.

If there was an emergency, they have nets to stretch out to catch the plane.

Stuff happens, people aren't perfect, and stuff breaks. From what I've read and heard from carrier pilots, night landings on a carrier are a white knuckle affair even when everything goes right.

I'm not saying there's nobody to blame, and I'm sure there will be a thorough investigation. But I'm less inclined to scream "incompetence" or "negligence" and break out the tar and feathers for something like this than I would be for the other two incidents.