We aren't in the Air Force(thank God). Air forces(and the military in general) take much higher chances of killing their people in training than is acceptable for civilians. This is rational as the prime purpose is to accomplish the mission and if it takes material and people to do that - that is how it is.
However as I remember it the RAAF didn't encourage spinning the Macchi back in the early 70's. I got to do extensive aerobatics in it but nobody talked about spinning it. Intentional solo spinning for the students wasn't allowed was it?(I was the base met man for 3 years and met men were encouraged to fly) ----------------- To answer Mike's question on spinning Macchi's: From my conversations with the ARDU test pilots in the very early 90's. The Macchi span like a top and had an exceptionally high descent rate in the spin. Once wound up it took some time to unwind too. Under some circumstances it tended to go flat (Sounds like a Pooch doesn't it!) and took even longer to recover. At the time of my flight in a Macchi the doctrine was to start very high and recover by 10,000 ft. If you passed thru 10,000' and still spinning you were supposed to eject. The 'legend' was that if you hadn't recovered as you went thru 10k, you weren't going to recover before the ground got in the way. Anthony _______________________________________________ Aus-soaring mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] To check or change subscription details, visit: http://lists.internode.on.net/mailman/listinfo/aus-soaring
