Look... And Learn

While we must offer our heart-felt condolences to the poor pilot who now has to face up to a hefty repair bill, we can't help but be in awe of the amazing photos that have been generously offered to ANN, to share with you all. One photo, in particular, shows the Mustang as it made first contact with the runway... presumably at the very instant/point of contact. Let's face it... a gear-up landing is a terrible event, but every one of them should serve as a warning to all of us that, "there but for the grace of God, go any of us..." and learn accordingly.

Photographer Richard Kramer tells us that, "I'm not a pilot or anything, just an enthusiast. I've been attending the annual Quad City Air Show for many years. I always seem to spend much of the show watching thru the lens of a camera. Although I take a lot of pictures and have had fairly good success, I'm also just a photo enthusiast." The guy may be "just a photo enthusiast," but as the photos show, he is anything but an amateur.

Richard tells us that, "I'm not a pilot, but a friend of mine is, so I sent him a copy of the picture and asked what he knew about it. To give you a little background, this occurred shortly after I arrived at the QCAS (Quad City Air Show) on 6/7/2003. My 2 yr old granddaughter seems to have a fascination with airplanes and we decided to take her to the air show for the 2nd time. For some reason, though, over the past month or so, she has been a little frightened by loud noises. So, we've been telling her 'It's ok, it's just noise, it won't hurt you'."

"Well, just after we arrived, I saw this P-51 approaching for what I first thought was just going to be a low pass. I thought it was a perfect opportunity to get a couple of good pictures, so I picked up the camera and got ready. As he got lower, and lower, I thought he was going to land rather than making a low pass, but I noticed the landing gear wasn't coming down. As I started shooting, I thought 'Oh no. I've been telling my grand daughter 'It's ok, it won't hurt you!'' and now we're about to witness a big fiery crash right in front of us!' Fortunately, all we heard was the underside of the plane scraping along the runway and then it slid off into the grass."

ANN truly appreciates Richard's immense generosity in sharing this dramatic photographic series with ANN...

**   Report created 6/09/2003   Record 43  **

IDENTIFICATION
  Regis#: UNK        Make/Model: P51      Description: P-51, F-51, A-36 Mustang
  Date: 06/07/2003     Time: 1540
  Event Type: Incident   Highest Injury: None     Mid Air: N    Missing: N
  Damage: Minor

LOCATION
  City: DAVENPORT   State: IA   Country: US

DESCRIPTION
ACFT LANDED RWY 15 WITH GEAR UP.  ACFT SKIDDED OFF THE WEST SIDE OF RWY. DAVENPORT ARPT, IA

INJURY DATA      Total Fatal:   0
                 # Crew:   1     Fat:   0     Ser:   0     Min:   0     Unk:   
                 # Pass:   0     Fat:   0     Ser:   0     Min:   0     Unk:   
                 # Grnd:         Fat:   0     Ser:   0     Min:   0     Unk:   
WEATHER: NOT AVAILABLE

OTHER DATA
  Activity: Pleasure      Phase: Landing      Operation: General Aviation
  Departed: UNKN   Dep Date:    Dep. Time:
  Destination: DAVENPORT, IA     Flt Plan:              Wx Briefing:
  Last Radio Cont: UNKN    Last Clearance:
  FAA FSDO: DES MOINES, IA  (CE01)    Entry date: 06/09/2003

FMI: www.quadcityairshow.com, www.faa.gov