Author: Rainbow Kursk
At the end of last year, a hundred million pound f-35B stealth fighter on the British aircraft carrier "Queen Elizabeth" crashed into the Mediterranean Sea, which once caused heated discussion among overseas military fans.
Recently, the F-35B fighter was salvaged out of the water photos appeared on the Internet, the entire fighter was placed upside down on the deck of the salvage ship, like a falling chicken, and the lower mouth cover of the tail vector spout was stuck in a half-open state, once again restoring the situation of the moment of falling into the water. According to the British Defence Magazine, at the same time that the fighter was salvaged, a crew member of the aircraft carrier was also arrested for leaking the video of the crash site.
Image: The F-35B fighter, like a chicken in the soup, died in a half-open state with its tail cover stuck, which may also be one of the causes of the crash.
The F-35B is a short-range/vertical take-off and landing type of the F-35 fighter series.
During short or vertical takeoffs, the mid-flight upgrade fan of the fighter will run at full capacity, spraying downward airflow to hold the fighter up. At the same time, the tail vent that can be rotated will also rotate below, providing lift for the fighter to take off.
When the tail spout rotates, the lower and lower fairing cover will also open downward to ensure the space for the tail spout to rotate. However, judging from the state of the F-35B fighter that was salvaged this time, the mouth cover was not fully opened at all, that is to say, the tail vent was not rotated in place, which was likely to lead to insufficient lift of the fighter and eventually crash.
Picture: The F-35B rotates at short takeoff, the position of rotation of the tail spout and the degree to which the fairing lid is open.
After the accident, there was a live video of the F-35B plane crashing into the sea on the aircraft carrier.
On November 29 last year, the video began circulating on social media. The video, which was obtained by British defense Twitter user @Seb H, is about 16 seconds long and may have been taken by security cameras on the carrier. As can be seen from the video, the fighter has taken off at a very slow speed, completely failing to reach the speed of take-off, and finally falling into the sea in an instant when the aircraft leaves the skid deck.
The British Defence Magazine quoted an "anonymous and reliable source" as saying that the male crew members involved had been arrested and sent back to the UK.
Previously, some people analyzed that the fighter forgot to take down the red waterproof cover of the engine air intake when taking off. Sailors on The British carrier allegedly told investigators they saw something that shouldn't have appeared in the accident's waters — "a red lid floating on the waters."
According to the regulations, these waterproof covers and engine baffles should be removed before taking off.
But I think that this error is not only too low-level, but also unlikely. Because the plane has to be confirmed by many people at the time of take-off, and the time monitoring of the tower, it is impossible to take off such a large waterproof cover before take-off. You know, there are a lot of things on the plane that need to be taken down before takeoff, in addition to the waterproof cover, there are many lock pins, and there will be a red cloth strip with the words "pull off the pin before take-off", just to remind the ground crew to prepare for take-off.
Picture: Such a large red waterproof cover cannot be taken off without taking off.
From the photos of this wreckage, the culprit may be a mechanical failure.
That is, the mouth cover of the tail spout rotation cannot be opened in place, resulting in the vector spout cannot be rotated to the normal take-off state, and eventually causes the fighter to fall into the sea due to insufficient lift during short take-off.
The "Queen Elizabeth" aircraft carrier has a dedicated deck for skid jumping and take-off, so the tail vent of the F-35B will generally rotate to a downward angle of about 45°. In the absence of a ski-jump deck for U.S. amphibious assault ships, the take-off of the F-35B fighter often requires the tail spout to rotate the tail vent to about 70 to 80 degrees downward, almost equivalent to vertical downward. This is also a benefit of the ski jump take-off deck. In addition, this deck also raised the altitude of the aircraft from the sea surface, allowing the ejection seat to have better life-saving conditions, which is the main reason why the pilot survived this incident!
Image: The "Queen Elizabeth" aircraft carrier F35B fighter takes off in normal condition, and the tail spout rotates to a 45° angle.