'Pilotless' Aircraft lands in airfield office.

[Phil Perry]

I regaled you with this story a few years back, but have since been given a photograph.

 

The aircraft was a Pegasus XL, Rotax 447 - 2 seat Trike. The owner 'Handpropped' it, with no wheel chocks nor anyone sitting in the pilot seat. The wreckage revealed that the throttle had been set to full power.

 

The engine started and the aircraft immediately ran away with the owner chasing it. It became airborne approx 100 metres away from the impact point and began a right turn. It lifted off a few metres from a line of parked aircraft and two people had to dive out of it's way. ( The machine had been parked with the right wingtip on the grass, a few metres away from the impact point. ) it climbed to an estimated 70 - 90 feet and as the turn steepened, descended rapidly. It bounced off a car and the trike body entered the Instructors' office doorway coming to rest as shown after turning through 270 degrees from the takeoff heading. One person suffered a broken ankle, he said that a wingtip struck him. two parked cars were also damgaed. This accident was never reported anywhere. There were around 50 - 60 people milling about at the time, so it was nothing short of a miracle that only one person was injured.

 

If you look closely, you can just see a sign, mostly obsured by the roller door, which says 'Chocks must be used when running up aircraft on the ground. - A runaway aircraft is an unforgiveable sin at ths airfield'

 

 

 

 

 

[turboplanner]

Very similar to the Google cars.

 

 

[Phil Perry]

Very similar to the Google cars.

I take it that you are alluding to 'Driverless' vehicles SIr.

 

I can't see that working well at the moment, BUT. . . .I've no doubt that our forebears could never comprehend te possibility of man carrying flying machines, nor Television,. . .nor the Interwebbywhatsit either. . .perhaps you and I are Dinosaurial of thought and concept, coupled with an inbuilt cynicism gene. . .?

 

Perhaps us Doomsayers will be proven totally incorrect, this, assuming that Gaia does not have to endure a Nuclear winter for a few cycles to get rid of human interference in the natural order of things. . . . Who Knows ?. . . if things go badly pearshaped in the Middle East, what survivors there may be might have to learn all over again how to live together as hunter gatherers, and some bright individual could well accidentally invent the Biplane and start off the cycle once again. . . . .ESPECIALLLY if archaeologists discover a copy of 'Jack Flyer' somewhere in the shifting sand dunes of Southern Australis. . . . . .

 

 

[Methusala]

Einstein was reported to have said that he wasn't sure what the third world war would be fought with but that the fourth would be fought with sticks and stones. Think about that. Don

 

 

[Phil Perry]

Einstein was reported to have said that he wasn't sure what the third world war would be fought with but that the fourth would be fought with sticks and stones. Think about that. Don

Yes Don,. . .I'm sure you're right. If there are only Scots, Welsh and English left, that fourth war wouldn't be long in starting either . . . . ! ! !

 

( Unless some clever sod re-invents the game of Soccer, which would only be marginally less terrible. . . )