Talk:1958 Syerston Avro Vulcan crash

Eye witness

I was there that day and witnessed the crash my recollection, standing about half way down the runway, was that part of the wing broke just opposite to where I was stood and the plane crashing out of sight. --palmiped |  Talk  13:48, 14 January 2014 (UTC)

I was another eye witness. I was six years old at the time, my father owned the farm that joined up with Syerston Airfield and threshold of runway 27. I was watching the display from the farm situated on the extended centre line from the runway about 600 yards from the crash site. The Vulcan passed over my head at approximately 600 feet and crashed on to the threshold of the runway. When the plane passed overhead it was a complete fireball on the approach before it crashed. The plane disintegrated on the final approach to the crash, one of the engines dropped about 150 yards in front of me. It bounced tearing the side out of a chicken house and bounced through a hedge. Debris was over a wide area.The debris site and our farm was under armed guard until all the bits were recovered. The chequered wagon was close to the threshold and was hit. If I had my way I was going to sit on the wooden perimeter fence to watch the display this was only a couple of hundred yards from the crash site. My lucky day!!!(martinlawton2@gmail.com). — Preceding unsigned comment added by 94.8.255.15 (talk) 17:49, 2 December 2015 (UTC)

The accident aircraft was the first Vulcan built, and unlike later, production Vulcans, as a prototype it had been designed for either Avon or Sapphire engines of around 7,000lb thrust, the intended Olympus engines of around 10,000lb being still under development and not available at the time the prototype was designed. In order to meet the altitude requirements of the B.35/46 Specification, and allow aerodynamic testing of the aircraft at these specified heights, c.50,000 feet, the airframe therefore had to be of lighter construction than subsequent airframes constructed after the more powerful Olympus became available.

At the time of the accident it was test-fitted with engines of around 15,000lb thrust, and it had not been rebuilt with the stronger (and heavier) wing structure that was incorporated into production 10,000lb thrust Olympus-powered Vulcans. As a result it had a weaker wing leading edge structure than production aircraft, and it had never been designed for the greater power of the Conway, (twice the installed power it had been designed for) and the greater aerodynamic and "g" loads at high power that became possible with that engine.

VX770 was known within Avro to be structurally weaker than production aircraft and the company had a programme of post-flight internal inspections of the wing leading edge structure for this particular aircraft while being flown with the Conways installed. Non-company pilots flying VX770 were briefed on this airframe's particular flight limitations prior to being allowed to fly the aircraft. Providing these limits were known and respected this need not have been a problem for any pilot, one simply had to be careful where and when one used high power and handle the aircraft with "kid gloves" while keeping a close watch of the ASI.

The pilot, who was flying the aircraft on behalf of the engine company, Rolls-Royce, almost certainly exceeded the briefed 350kt speed for the flypast and unwittingly exceeded the airframe limitations, perhaps due to oversight, a momentary lapse of memory, or a desire to give a good flypast, and the aircraft disintegrated. Ground observers estimated the aircraft's speed during the flypast to be around 450kts, some 100kts higher than briefed.

The Vulcan had been designed with a large wing to give good manoeuvrability in the thin air at very high altitudes. At low altitudes in thick air it generates a lot of lift if moving at any speed. With the original Avons or Sapphires this was not a problem for VX770, as they could not, except in a dive, drive the aircraft fast enough at low level to reach that airframe's design aerodynamic load and strength limitations. Unfortunately, the 15,000lb Conways could. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 95.150.100.247 (talk) 10:46, 18 July 2016 (UTC)