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« Thank You | Main | Kerry Likens Terror War to a War He Fought Against » September 27, 2004Volunteering for DangerTim Worstall does the math after digging up this bit of information... The F-102 claimed the lives of many pilots, including a number stationed at Ellington during Bush's tenure. Of the 875 F-102A production models that entered service, 259 were lost in accidents that killed 70 Air Force and ANG pilots....and finds that Lt. George W. Bush was statistically only slightly less likely to get killed during the two years he spent learning to fly the F-102 than John Kerry was during his four months in Vietnam. And remember, after Bush learned to fly the F-10 he volunteered for Palace Alert, a Vietnam mission, but was turned down becuase he didn't yet have 500 hours of flying experience. Kerry was honorable and corageous to voluntarily enlist in the Navy during Vietnam. His four months in Vietnam deserves our respect. But to say that Bush's voluntary enlisment in the Air National Guard, and his willingness to train full-time for two years to fly a dangerous aircraft, and his subsequent volunteering for a Vietnam combat mission, represents an attempt to hide from danger, is ludicrous. Both men served honorably during the war. Only one came home and slandered his comrades afterward. And only one spent two decades in the U.S. Senate voting to gut the military at the height of the Cold War and voting to reduce funding for our intelligence services even after 9/11. Posted in Was Bush AWOL?
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8% fatality rate for the pilot, and 29.6% failure rate of the plane. This puppy is truely a flying coffin. Posted by: BigFire at September 27, 2004 10:16 AMWhat made the F-102 so dangerous? Why was it not grounded? Why would they allow pilots with less than 500 hours to fly it? Posted by: SemiPundit at September 27, 2004 10:31 AMThe F-102 was developed in the early 1950s when jet technology was still immature. If you look at the accident rates of several other of the "Century Series" fighters (e.g. F-100 through F-106), you'll see they had a lot of crashes due to engine and system problems. The fatality rate was so high because the several of those designs, including the F-102, didn't have "zero-zero" ejection seats. With those old ejection seats, if you got into trouble during takeoff or landing, you were at too low an altitude to safely eject. Takeoff and landing accidents killed a lot of people. The F-102 was the first delta-winged fighter to enter service (at least in the US, perhaps anywhere). Delta winged aircraft have very high drag at high angles of attack (angle between the wing and the airflow). The F-102 was somewhat underpowered, so if you got into a high sink rate, even full power might not be enough to get you out of trouble. This is what the term "behind the power curve" means. They allowed pilots with less than 500 hours to fly it because of the way they were trained. By the time a pilot candidate graduated Undergraduate Pilot Training back then, he would've had experience in the T-37 and T-38 jet trainers. According to what I've read, the T-38 is a pretty demanding plane to fly. Like all other prospective F-102 pilots, Bush underwent about 3 months of training in the TF-102A two seat trainer version of the plane before flying the F-102A single seater. Posted by: Larry J at September 27, 2004 11:30 AMDid Kerry volunteer for the Navy or Navy Reserve? (Unfit for Command says the latter and i have not seen anyone claim that this is a lie.) Posted by: craig henry at September 27, 2004 02:03 PMAs for Kerry joining the Navy or the Navy Reserve, I'm not certain. It's possible the confusion comes from having a Reserve Commission as opposed to a regular commission. When I was commissioned in the Air Force via Officer Training School, I had a reserve commission even though I was on active duty. Perhaps the same applied to Kerry. He was on active duty in the Navy but maybe he had a reserve commission. Posted by: Larry J at September 27, 2004 03:37 PMPost a comment
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