U-2 spy plane crashes in Northern California, ejecting 2 pilots
Source: SFGate
A U-2 plane crashed in Sutter County after two pilots ejected from the cockpit, the U.S. Air Force said Tuesday.
An official at Beale Air Force Base east of Marysville where the plane was from didnt immediately have further information.
The crash happened near West Butte and Pass roads near the summit, according to KCRA.
Read more: http://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/Two-pilots-ejected-after-U-2-plane-crashes-in-9234594.php
Photo: DAVE NIELSEN, Associated Press
This is a 1988 file photo of a U-2 spy plane as it takes off from Beale Air Force Base near Marysville, Calif. A U-2 from the base crashed Tuesday morning in Sutter County, according to the U.S. Air Force.
CBGLuthier
(12,723 posts)Odd headline.
Journeyman
(15,042 posts)scscholar
(2,902 posts)I doubt they ejected after the crash.
PJMcK
(22,056 posts)forest444
(5,902 posts)Most of them these days are content with being glorified stenographers.
Can't say I blame them entirely; being anything more than that is liable to get you blackballed in today's corporate media world.
citood
(550 posts)Any time I know the details of a story, I find mistakes in the news article about it. People's occupations or titles are wrong, the address is wrong, etc.
Lets just say that not a lot of editing and fact checking is happening these days, as news budgets get tighter.
awoke_in_2003
(34,582 posts)that made me go "WTF". Seriously, what ever happened to editors?
http://www.democraticunderground.com/114217051
PJMcK
(22,056 posts)How could a writer not think about what they were writing?
Sloppy and unprofessional.
Islandurp
(188 posts)Maybe it made more sense in spanish.
awoke_in_2003
(34,582 posts)but I have seen some real doozies that are all English
treestar
(82,383 posts)They don't even care any more.
cstanleytech
(26,334 posts)Edit: Never knew a jet could eject its pilots lol
Iggo
(47,578 posts)William Seger
(10,779 posts)"U-2 plane crashes in Northern California after 2 pilots eject" would work.
Quackers
(2,256 posts)Unfortunately, it wasn't until after the ejection that the spy plane realized it didn't have autopilot. Who said that when machines became self aware they had to be smart?
ffr
(22,674 posts)Edited to take out the misleading reference to a 1996 U-2 crash. Sutter Buttes is remote cattle country, but there are a few ranch style homes there.
Historic NY
(37,454 posts)A U-2 plane from Beale Air Force Base crashed in August 1996
ffr
(22,674 posts)It wasn't my intention to mislead. I scanned through the story. My error.
vkkv
(3,384 posts)WHEN CRABS ROAR
(3,813 posts)1. It's dry AF over there.
2. The county mounties use helicopters and small planes to look for pot grows, if they look at all.
3. You can grow pot in CA with a $45 weed card anyway. The only thing a grower might be in trouble for would be diverting a waterway for irrigation (huge problem) or something. But again, that would be an issue on the wet west side of the coast range, not in the bone dry north valley. Seriously look at a map.
4. The U-2 flies on the edge of space to do surveillance over states where flying at reasonable heights is dangerous. North Korea is involved in exciting new nuclear fuckery. It's not hard to guess what they were doing.
5. Jesus Fucking Christ not everything is about weed.
vkkv
(3,384 posts)Response to vkkv (Reply #11)
Post removed
vkkv
(3,384 posts)growers that I know who live in the 'Gold Country' of North / central California.
I bet you're fun at parties.
backscatter712
(26,355 posts)They have a very narrow flight envelope. If you're at altitude, it may be as small as five knots of airspeed. That's called the "coffin corner" of the flight envelope.
Fly too fast, and you hit the critical Mach limit, and you lose control of the aircraft as it tries to flip around, which will probably result in the wings being ripped off.
Fly too slow, and the aircraft stalls, and tries to flutter to the ground like a leaf, which also results in losing control, overstressing the airframe, and Bad Things.
Also, the Dragon Lady's a nightmare to land...
ffr
(22,674 posts)Stupid plane!
backscatter712
(26,355 posts)So it's really difficult to land the bird gently. You have to glide it... glide it... glide it..., hope it settles that last six feet to the ground gently, then WHAM! Nearly break the landing gear and your back when it suddenly stalls.
That bicycle landing gear isn't much help either - you have to be constantly working to keep the U-2 level, so when it lands, it gently leans to one side, onto one of the skids on the wingtips. And as the video shows, the plane's constantly trying to yaw, so you're trying to correct with the rudder pedals. Overcorrect, and you spin out...
There's a reason why they have fellow pilots in those chase cars guiding the U-2 down during landings.
ChairmanAgnostic
(28,017 posts)What do you expect?
I am not surprised that the U2, F-16, F-18, and others still fly effectively. I don't see the F-35 doing that. Heck, the B-52 may outlive it.
AngryAmish
(25,704 posts)F 14, that is a widow maker. Remember the first female F 14 jock? She stalled on approach iirc correctly. That thing was mean.
ChairmanAgnostic
(28,017 posts)And carries solid weapons.
Instead. We have a seriously underperforming, overpriced beast that required at least 3 serious downgrades of the original specs to allow it to "meet" specifications.
REminds me of the BP refinery in Gary Indiana. Their refining processes were adding so many poisons to Lake Michigan water (in violation of both state and federal law) that the state finally forced the issue. They changed the standards to benefit BP. The fact that kids had more chrome and lead in their drinking water didn't seem to matter much.
jmowreader
(50,567 posts)U-2s are made of very thin metal for weight reduction.
The U-2 may be a "stupid" plane, but it's good at its job.
AngryAmish
(25,704 posts)Does most airplanes have for lack of a better term a keel, a big steel girder down the the middle they hang the wings, etc from?
If the parachute is bolted hard to sead keel, at a low enough speed it could work, yes?
backscatter712
(26,355 posts)Aircraft do have a skeleton - in the wings and fuselage, under the skin, you've got a frame that's usually made of ribs and spars.
That frame's made out of aluminum, and is strong enough to hold the aircraft together, with a little extra for safety.
That main structure's not going to be nearly as stout as a steel I-beam.
Now, the U-2 is special. It was designed by taking an F-104 Starfighter, yes, that 50's jet with the little stubby wings. Stretch the fuselage a bit to make room for fuel and recon/intel cameras. Then replace that little tiny stubby wing with a great big huge sailplane wing.
Now you've got an aircraft that can soar to 80,000 feet, which at the time it was built, was high enough to be out of range of virtually all anti-aircraft weapons and missiles. Pretty cool, just as long as you don't mind spending hours flying the plane at the coffin-corner of the envelope, and you don't mind those hairy extreme-ground-effect landings.
The design compromises to make this design possible are borderline insane. If you watch the U-2 landing, on top of requiring the chase-car to help guide the pilot as he lands, notice that the wings flex quite a bit. Putting a drag chute on that plane could do things like causing the wings to be ripped off when the fuselage is yanked to a stop, or it could cause the speed to drop suddenly which would cause the nose to spike into the ground during one of those hairy landings.
The Air Force decided parachutes didn't work, and instead they have fast chase cars driven by fellow U-2 pilots, acting as guides.
Warpy
(111,383 posts)flying-skeleton
(698 posts)truthisfreedom
(23,159 posts)in fact I'm calling it right now before he does. A U2 crashed. You heard it here folks. It's huge. It's hUge-2.
On edit, I feel terrible for making light of this. One pilot dead. Tragic.
OnlinePoker
(5,727 posts)mahatmakanejeeves
(57,664 posts)hack89
(39,171 posts)it is larger and more capable than the original U-2.
olddad56
(5,732 posts)They were replaced in the late 60s by the SR-7!. Those flew out of Beale for years and when they stopped using the SR-71, they were replaced by the U2s.
GummyBearz
(2,931 posts)With one notable exception the U-2 has done an amazing job in the last 60 years
Javaman
(62,534 posts)after all, he is friends with ex-kgb head putin.
ffr
(22,674 posts)One pilot is dead following a military plane crash near the Sutter Butte mountain range in Sutter County. There is no word on the condition of the other pilot at this time. The unidentified pilot died sometime after ejecting from the U-2 Dragon Lady reconnaissance plane, which sent a mayday call around 9 a.m.
http://www.actionnewsnow.com/news/beale-afb-spokesperson-one-pilot-confirmed-dead-in-sutter-butte-u-2-crash-/
PersonNumber503602
(1,134 posts)Hassin Bin Sober
(26,347 posts)George the Retiree
(50 posts)After all, that's all that matters!
metalbot
(1,058 posts)but it's rather tasteless.
PersonNumber503602
(1,134 posts)The headline does say they ejected.