Mig 15 restoration

[willedoo]

Sad news a couple of weeks ago to hear of the crash on takeoff of the Mig 15UTI, registered as HA-UTI which has been under restoration for the last five years by the Jet Age Foundation of Hungary. The first post restoration flight was on the 11th. of July & it crashed on the 18th. July on it's fourth flight. It must have been heart breaking for all the people who were involved in the project, thankfully the pilots were not injured.

 

There was video taken of the accident, it seemed to be struggling a bit to take off, then banked to the left, hit the ground & became airborne again before finally landing on it's belly. Almost seems like there might have been a malfunction with the aileron or something, haven't seen any recent news giving any indication of the cause.

 

The damage was fairly extensive & it probably won't fly again. They're a fairly tough old bird, but it broke the starboard wing, messed up the underside port wing & lower fuselage & gear. It hit pretty hard, so there probably would be a fair bit of structural stress damage inside the airframe as well. It's anybodys guess as to it's future, if they could track down a reasonable airframe, they have a good engine & other components, but it's a huge setback.

 

Here's an article with a bit of background:

 

http://www.hungariandefence.com/cikk/27048/a-restored-%E2%80%9Ceagle%E2%80%9D

 

They seem to incorrectly state that it's one of only three airworthy in the world, fairly sure there's a lot more than that, one operates out of Rockhampton, Qld. & there's a fair few in the US. There's a few videos on the project on this link:

 

http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=roncskutatas+&aq=f

 

Always sad to see such dedication & passion suffer a setback like this, hopefully some good will come of it.

 

Cheers, Willedoo.

 

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