Path: utzoo!utgpu!watserv1!watmath!att!cbnews!military
From: hamish@waikato.ac.nz
Newsgroups: sci.military
Subject: Re: US Fighter Designations
Message-ID: <1990Aug14.033900.9139@cbnews.att.com>
Date: 14 Aug 90 03:39:00 GMT
References: <1990Jul31.223607.6367@cbnews.att.com> <1990Aug7.040812.6711@cbnews.att.com>
Sender: military@cbnews.att.com (William B. Thacker)
Organization: University of Waikato, Hamilton, New Zealand
Lines: 32
Approved: military@att.att.com



From: hamish@waikato.ac.nz
In article <1990Aug7.040812.6711@cbnews.att.com>, phil@zorch.SF-Bay.ORG (Phil Gustafson) writes:
> One problem was its ejection system.  Most modern fighters have "zero-
> altitude" ejection seats -- the ejection cannon shoots the pilot high
> enough that he can eject more or less safely while the plane is on
> the ground.  This is handy for malfuntions on takeoff and approach.
> 
> The F-104 ejection seat fired _down_, making this difficult.  I've
> heard undocumented stories of desperate pilots in damaged, low-flying
> F-104's flipping inverted to eject upward, but not surviving. Yuck.

 I have a book that mentions this and also mentions that the manufacturers
originally wanted to install Martin Baker ejection seats, but the fact that
they were British and the downward firing ones were American got the 
politicians into the act and it was blocked. 

 Eventually the West Germans decided that enough pilots had been killed and
refitted the planes with the British Martin Baker seats that fired upwards.
Apparently the mortality rate shot downwards after that.

==============================================================================
|  Hamish Marson                        |  Internet  hamish@waikato.ac.nz    |
|  Computer Support Person              |  Phone  (071)562889 xt 8181        |
|  Computer Science Department          |  Amiga 3000 for ME!                |
|  University of Waikato                |                                    |
==============================================================================
|Disclaimer:  Anything said in this message is the personal opinion of the   |
|             finger hitting the keyboard & doesn't represent my employers   |
|             opinion in any way. (ie we probably don't agree)               |
==============================================================================