Years ago when I was attending the USAF Accident Investigation School
at USC, the professor, Harry Hurt, author of Aerodynamics for Naval
Aviators, related a story about an aircraft crash that occured at his
alma mater, Texas A&M.
After WWII, there was a need for an agricultural spray aircraft that
would incorporate some crash survivability features because the old
Stearmans had a habit if killing pilots when they stalled and went in
from a low altitude. The A&M aircraft was built with a long nose to
provide space for chemical tanks and to provide a crushable area to
decrase the g forces in the event of a crash, and also had an
automatic shoulder harness, something new for that era. The aircraft
looked like the spray aircraft we see today, but this one was a bit
underpowered.
The first flight test was a doozy. Cameras were set up to record the
take off and landing and as the test pilot got airborne he racked the
airplane up and to the left in a dramatic climbing turn. The
aircraft stalled, rolled to the right and went straight in with all
the cameras rolling. Analysis of the camera footage revealed that,
at impact, the shoulder harness locked automatically as the pilot's
upper torso moved abruptly forward and the nose structure began to
deform at a rate that diminished the g forces to something more
survivable. With the shoulder harness locked, the pilot's arms flew
forward and his head pitched down. As the airplane came to rest, the
pilot's torso was pulled back toward his seat and as the aircraft
came to rest, he turned his head toward the cameras and his face
broke out in a great big grin.
The airplane was the AG-1, another succesful design by fred E. Weick.
Bart
