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Vickers Valiant Crash, Spanhoe, 12th August 1960
At 1035 on Friday the 12th August 1960, Vickers Valiant XD864 took off from RAF Wittering, the nose wheel failed to retract and after a standard 30o banked turn of 180o, the aircraft hit the ground at 1038 on the disused airfield of Spanhoe some 7 miles south west of Wittering. The plane burst into flames and all five crew were killed.
The Crew
The Captain was Flight Lieutenant Brian J Wickham, co-pilot F/L W (William?) R Howard, Nav/plotter F/L Harry G Bullen, Nav/radar F/L Johnny Ireson and AEO Sgt Roy H Johnson.
Wickham was thirty-eight and married and had first flown with the RAF on 1st April 1943, left the service at the end of the war but returned in 1951. He had over 3,600 hours flying time, including Shackletons and Canberras and 810 hours as a 1st pilot in Valiants. Howard was twenty-nine and began flying in November 1957 before joining 138 squadron in March 1960 and was considered an inexperienced co-pilot as he had only flown 116 hours in Valiants, although he had a total of 408 flying hours. Bullen, who was forty, had joined the RAF before WW2 and had flown as an Air Gunner, then Air Bomber in Halifaxes during the war, and stayed on after, flying in Lancasters and Canberras. He had flown a total of 3,256 hours with 846 in Valiants. Ireson, thirty and married, had 805 hours in Valiants and 1,527 hours in total. Johnson was twenty-six, married with two children and had been with the squadron for fifteen months having flown 805 hours in Valiants, and a total of 2,210 flying hours.
Wickham, Bullen and Ireson had worked as a crew together since they joined 7 squadron in November 1957 from OCU Gaydon and all three had previously been in XV squadron with Canberras. Johnson had only joined the crew in May 1960. Howard was borrowed from 138 squadron and had never flown with this crew before. Clearly, apart from Howard, this was a very experienced crew.
The Aircraft
XD864 was one of the final batch of Valiants to be completed by Vickers and was delivered to 7 squadron, Honington in March 1957 and by August 1960 it had flown 1,102 hours. The aircraft had only ever had one minor problem in that time when a tyre burst on landing. In October 1959 three of its engines were replaced and in April 1960 replacement of the fourth was carried out. Wickham had flown this plane on 13 sorties.
What Happened?
The preparations for the flight were hurried. The usual co-pilot, F/L Norman Rea, had been sent to Malta as part of a crew to collect a repaired Valiant and so Wickham had to ring round to find a replacement. He phoned Squadron Leader D A Perkins of 138 Squadron and managed to engage the services of Howard but was warned that he was a junior co-pilot and inexperienced, and that Wickham should keep an eye on him. Wickham said 'that's quite alright'.
The crew attended a briefing to be told the weather was good and Squadron Leader Howard Spackman ('A' Flight Commander, 7 squadron) then briefed Wickham to carry out a Profile Flight in Valiant XD864. This exercise entailed some navigation and simulated bombing attacks, a flight of around six hours. Meanwhile, Crew Chief, Chief Technician John McCafferty took over responsibility for the preparation of XD864 at the dispersal area at 0800 that morning. Much of the Before Flight Inspection had been carried out the previous evening; all that remained were certain vital items, the completion of which McCafferty supervised, and the loading of 63,125lbs of fuel, about 83% of capacity and enough for seven hours flying. This gave an all up weight of 146,311 lbs (maximum was 167,000 lbs).
At 0955 the crew arrived at dispersals and all except Wickham climbed on board the aircraft. Wickham then did a complete external check, but without using a check list. He then checked McCafferty's paperwork before signing in the acceptance column. Wickham then boarded the plane and proceeded to carry out the internal checks. At the end of the checks he said 'TPI (tail plane incidence) to co-pilot fine, take off'. This meant that Howard would be taking off the plane. The checks continued normally for engine start up and at 1025 Wickham taxied out, stopping for a short time, and then moving on to the take off point on runway 26.
Brakes were released and at 1035 XD864 was airborne. From the ground, some observers noticed that the climb was a bit steeper than normal. It was also seen that, whilst the main wheels had retracted the nose wheel had not. This was reported to the control tower and Wickham was informed. He acknowledged and seemed to be aware of the problem and said he would remain in the local area to 'sort it out'. At about six miles from Wittering the plane entered a standard 30o banked turn, presumably to enter the downwind leg of the Wittering circuit. From the ground it was seen that the turn was smooth but the plane seemed slower and quieter than usual and appeared to loose height. The 180o turn was completed and the plane levelled out but was now loosing height rapidly. Almost immediately the port wing dipped sharply, then levelled out and the plane entered a shallow dive. The engines were heard to increase rpm and the nose came up but the port wing dipped again and this time clipped the ground. The plane slewed around, the port wing fuel tank was crushed and fuel ignited. XD864 disintegrated and burst into flames; the five crew were killed instantly. The crash occurred at 1038, three minutes after take-off, on a disused airfield about seven miles south west of Wittering called Spanhoe. RAF and local fire engines arrived in twenty minutes but it took a couple of hours to put the fires out. The remains of the crew were taken to the public mortuary at Kettering General Hospital.
Board of Inquiry
A Board of Inquiry was convened immediately and produced its report on the 24th August 1960.
The Board found that the condition of the plane when it crashed was that the nose wheel was down (this was determined by its operating jack ram being contracted and that the doors were open) but main undercarriage was up. Because the nose wheel area was almost completely destroyed it couldn't find the cause of the failure to retract. The flaps were up and the engines were under considerable power at the time of impact. Apart from the nose wheel, there wasn't anything unserviceable about the plane.
After consulting a number of witnesses and using a flight simulator, the board reconstructed the flight and determined the causes of the accident.
Reconstruction of the Flight
The crew were short of time and their preparations were rather hurried because of the need to find a co-pilot. Nevertheless the Captain decided that he would allow the co-pilot to take off and complete the climb. The co-pilot took off and climbed rather more steeply than usual with full climbing power. The nose wheel failed to retract so the speed was kept down to 170 knots. The aircraft levelled off between 1,000 and 1,500 feet above airfield level (300 feet) but the co-pilot allowed the speed to exceed 170 knots so the Captain throttled back temporarily to help control speed and height. With the aircraft flying at 160 knots with a power setting of approximately 6,000 rpm and a height of about 1,000 feet above airfield level, the captain then ordered the co-pilot to start a normal 30o banked turn to the left to bring the aircraft on the downwind leg prior to completion of undercarriage checks. The captain would be keeping a look out to the left in the turn. As the aircraft turned it would lose speed and height until it reached the stalling speed of 137 knots after about 90o of turn. The unsteadiness of the aircraft would attract the Captain's attention and he would doubtless order the co-pilot to come out of the turn, or take control himself. Realising the seriousness of his position he would grab the controls. The automatic reflex action to pull back could stall the aircraft and normal stall recovery would have to be taken. The call for extra power may well have been delayed, or the opening of the throttles delayed, either by indecision as to who was in control, or by the slow reactions of the co-pilot. The Captain would make every endeavor to avoid hitting the ground, but unfortunately the ground he was flying towards was higher than he would expect (350 feet). Still sinking, he pulled the control column too far back and stalled into the ground from a low height and low forward speed, but with engines developing more and more power.
Summary
The Board find that the aircraft, in a clean configuration apart from the nose wheel which was down, entered a normal turn at a speed of about 160 knots with an engine power setting which was too low to maintain height and speed. The aircraft lost speed and height and eventually stalled. It recovered but stalled again when just above the ground. The Board could find no evidence to suggest unserviceability of the aircraft, except the nose wheel.
Primary Cause of the Accident
The Board find that the primary cause of the accident was pilot error in entering a turn with insufficient speed and/or engine power to maintain an adequate safety margin over the stalling speed for the relevant flight configuration, i.e. clean aircraft. This resulted in loss of control and the crash of the aircraft.
Secondary Causes
The Board find that the secondary causes of the accident are:
a) The failure of the nose wheel to retract.
b) Pilot error in retracting the flaps before complete retraction of the undercarriage. This is contrary to standard procedure as taught and detailed in Pilot's Notes.
Contributory Causes
There is no direct evidence to prove that the co-pilot definitely completed the take off, climb or turn. If in fact, he did so, the Board consider it would be a contributory cause as he might not appreciate his high stalling speed in a turn at the heavy weight of the aircraft. There is evidence that the preparation for the flight was hurried. The Board consider that the relief felt by the pilots in achieving the required take off time, followed by the realisation that the flight was abortive due to the nose wheel malfunction, may have inculcated a sense of relaxation or disappointment sufficient to distract them from proper concentration during the short period of flight after take off. There is no evidence to show the state of mind of the pilots, but if the Board is correct in its surmise, the hurried preparation for the flight would form an additional contributory cause of the accident.
Allocation of Responsibility
The Board find that the Captain F/L Wickham is directly responsible for the accident.
The Board find that the degree of responsibility amounts to blameworthy negligence, unless there was sudden sickness to one of the pilots in which case the degree of responsibility amounts to negligence.
Comments of OC Wittering
G/C L H Trent added some comments to the report.
He agrees with the allocation of responsibility but not the contributory causes of the crash. He felt it was the Captain's responsibility to appreciate the high stalling speed and it is very easy to monitor what the co-pilot is doing. He also says that it is the Captain's responsibility for selecting power settings and monitoring airspeed. Whilst he agrees preparations were hurried he does not think they were a contributory cause.
He adds that the Squadron Commander is astonished that F/L Wickham, who gave every impression of being a sensible and cautious pilot, should raise the flaps before the undercarriage was completely up.
Comments
I've extracted some relevant comments from the Proceedings of Investigation into the crash. I should add that I'm no aviator and am not sitting in judgment.
Nose Wheel and Flaps
The failure of the nose wheel to retract shouldn't be catastrophic (from the records of 7 squadron, there were at least four similar incidences of this with Valiants in the three previous years. In all these, fuel was dumped and planes landed successfully).
F/L Rea, Wickham's normal co-pilot, provided some notes on the usual take off procedure when flying with Wickham. If Wickham himself was carrying out the take off, when the plane was airborne, Wickham would call for brakes and undercarriage up. Rea would wait four seconds then select undercarriage 'up', throttle back to 7,800 rpm and await Wickham's instructions to select flap 'in'. The instruction to select flap 'in' would be dependent on the aircraft's speed and was very often whilst the undercarriage was still retracting.
W/C Blaise P Mugford, OC 7 Squadron, says the squadron's normal procedure was to delay retraction of flaps until the undercarriage was fully retracted and all lights out. This was the practice he'd seen in all the tests he'd carried out.
The Flying Order Book (Section C, Order No 24) details the action in the event of an undercarriage malfunction. Generally speaking, attempts to rectify the problem after undercarriage fails to retract were forbidden as these mostly led to more serious difficulties and could hide the original cause. The only exception was if the problem was caused by a single fuse failure; this could be changed only once. In all other cases, undercarriage is to be lowered, left undisturbed and a landing made as soon as practicable.
Howard Carrying out the Take Off
The Board in their report discuss the attitude of the crew to flying and suggest that Wickham may have been approaching an overconfident stage in his flying. The decision to allow Howard to take off the plane was 'at least unwise' in view of his inexperience and although Wickham had flown with inexperienced co-pilots before 'quite successfully', he was not a QFI. Not using a check list in pre flight checks was another example, as was the fact that he allowed Bullen to fly without a helmet (apparently he didn't have one in his kit and made no attempt to get one - he gets a posthumous ticking off for this although of course it wouldn't have helped much in this incident!). Such an overconfident attitude could lead to slow reactions in an emergency.
Stalling Speed
The Board estimated the average speed for the three minute flight was 160 knots. The stall speed for a Valiant of all up weight 143,000lbs in level flight and clean condition is 126 knots, and with a 30o bank, 137 knots. With 20o flap the stall speeds would be reduced by about 15 knots.
Using a Flight Simulator with the appropriate settings, the Board were able to reproduce much of the actual observations of the flight. If the plane took off more steeply than usual and with high power, it was found that in order to obtain stable level flight at 170 knots, a large reduction in power was required. To control the speed it was necessary to throttle right back and then increase to a low power of 6,000 rpm. If the aircraft then entered a 30o banked turn at 160 knots, after the first 45o of turn, the speed was reduced to 145 knots with 200 feet of height lost. After 90o speed was 140 knots and another 200 feet lost. After this the speed fell rapidly below the 137 knot stall speed so in the test the Captain took control to simulate a recovery but a further 600 feet of height was lost (the simulator could not actually simulate a stall). They also concluded that if the speed on entry to the turn had been 170 knots (or more), and with appropriate power, the turn could be completed safely.
It was also calculated that when the aircraft first hit the ground it was travelling at 122.8 knots. This was done by F/L Harold Lax, who was OC NBS Servicing Flight, Wittering. Calculator 3 of XD864's NBS survived undamaged and if the electrical power is completely cut off from this, the airspeed setting will remain in position. It read 122.8 knots.
Funerals
There was a funeral procession by 7 squadron on Tuesday the 16th August which took the bodies of Wickham, Bullen, Ireson and Johnson from Honington to St Peter's church, Great Livermere. Wickham, Bullen and Ireson were later cremated at Ipswich crematorium and Johnson was buried in Honington cemetery. There was a similar procession for Howard by 138 squadron from Wittering; he was buried in Wittering cemetery.
Source of Information
The source of nearly all the information is the 'Proceedings of Investigation into Aircraft Accident 12th August 1960 of XD864 at Spanhoe', document BT233/439 at The National Archives, Kew, but there are a few additional snippets I found in 7 Squadrons Form 540 in AIR27/2689 and AIR27/2728, also at The National Archives, Kew.
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