Air shows thrill those watching from ground. They also kill many of those who dare to spin for us in the air.
If being a pilot is dangerous, performing vertical lifts, inverted stunts and dangerous twirls can be far more perilous, as pilots agree.
IAF pilot Sqn. Leader Sahil Gandhi, father of a five-year-old, was to have performed with his mates as part of the Surya Kiran Aerobatic Team (SKAT) at the Yelahanka Air Base from February 20 to 24. The air base is about 30 km from the city.
On Tuesday, just before noon, the Hawk MK.132 trainer that he was practising in over the air base, and another SKAT plane came in a chilling contact with each other. The two planes crashed outside the air field, exploding in flames and killing Mr. Gandhi who could not bail himself out of the damaged plane. His two teammates in the other display plane, Wg. Commander Vijay Shelke and Sqn. Leader Tejeshwar Singh, ejected. They have been hospitalised with injuries.
The Hawks danced in formation in the Bengaluru skies for the first time in Aero India 2017. Two years later, the aerobatics team stands grounded until the inquiry is over.
Many more
Stories from around the world speak of six to 12 fatal crashes at or around air shows each year.
On February 2, 2007, a Dhruv helicopter from a one-show-old Sarang aerobatics team crashed around the same venue, killing co-pilot Sqn. Leader Priyesh Sharma instantly and the pilot, Wg. Commander Vikas Jetly, after four years in coma. It happened four days before the air show opened that year.
Fatal collision
This is how Aerobaticteams.net described Tuesday’s crash: “The crash [occurred] ... when two of the team’s aircraft collided performing mirror pass or Calypso pass (as it named in Thunderbirds routine). In this manoeuvre one of the aircraft fly on top of the other but inverted. In this incident, the inverted aircraft has one pilot [and] the other [has] two pilots.”
“Both aircraft collided as the nose of the inverted aircraft was badly damaged from which the pilot did not succeed to eject. The two pilots of the first aircraft managed to eject, [but] the other pilot involved in the crash did not and died.”
Kiran’s journey
Surya Kiran means sun rays. The IAF formed its first SKAT in 1996 with nine Kiran Mk2 trainer aircraft. That was just before Avia India 1996, the show that heralded Aero India every odd year since then.
The SKAT was the showstopper of almost all Aero India shows until 2011 and treated visitors with their tri-colour smoke trails.
Once the IAF acquired Hawk advanced jet trainers from BAE Systems, it phased out the Kirans in 2011. It also re-built a new Hawk display team with the same name.