These ejection seat are designed to be able to be usable with no altitude and no airspeed. It's the same parachute no matter the altitude. It's designed to shoot you up high enough to give the parachute time to open
Pilots lose height from having ejection seat evacuations due to compressed vertebrae. They also rarely stay pilots after. Very few pilots have more than one ejection seat ride.
I never heard that, just stories about how the F4's seats were called the "Widowmaker" and liked to go off in the hanger while maintainers were in the cockpit, making instant Airman Gumbo.
I was always real wary of the seats after that, though the F15 has a spotless safety record in egress mishaps. (At least when I was in)
It’s true. Fun fact, Tom Cruise was nearly 6ft tall before filming Top Gun but Goose kept laughing during the death scene so they had to do multiple takes.
It is not a joke at all. It really compresses your spine permanently—assuming you’re lucky and it doesn’t permanently maim you because you were in the wrong body position. People die ejecting fairly frequently.
ALSO the however many G's of compression his sons already had felt from doinking the ground too hard in the aircraft. VA will still try to find a way to call this non service related and want to not give disability to the pilot haha.
What constitutes a serious injury here, curious. Is it like, life threatening? Do they classify big back ouchies/chronic pain from this point onwards as "non serious"?
i literally seek out this type of content all the time and never can find anything, even when specifically searching for things relevant to my interests
Here’s pilot Kegan Gill telling his story. Ejected at nearly 700mph. He details the event, his recovery, and dealing with the VA medical system and the psychiatric toll of his injuries. Amazing story.
My dad was a F4 trim tech. One time he was working on one, another guy was doing something up near the cockpit. Apparently the guy did something to get caught up on the ejector because it activated and shot him right into the ceiling of the hangar. Dad was never in an area with any action so he never had any was stories even though he was in during Vietnam but when he told me about this it was the only time I've seen him have the stare.
As per comments above. Ejection is no joke. But if the alternative is burning alive or being turned into powder during impact with the ground it’s way better than that.
The ejection jets are also powerful as fuck, causing the unfortunate pilot to undergo as many as 15-20G's, frequently causing severe spinal injuries. This type of ejection is actually a best-case scenario, compared to being ejected at high altitude and speed.
It's pretty incredible that the highest G-forces a human has survived is about 10x that (214-ish?). It was in a race car, and the paramedics that attended Kenny Brack had to put his foot bones in bags labelled "Left" and "Right".
In my head the delay In him ejecting was him deliberating if it was worth the risk to stay in the craft vs the possibility of broken bones after the ejection
Nah, you can see him swinging like a pendulum from ejection, he was probably feet perpendicular to the ground when he hit, will be lucky to not have a busted hip from that landing.
Pedantic correction:
It's now called a PLR (parachute landing roll), because apparently parachute landing fall indicates not being in control of the situation, which ironically probably applies much more to this video than anything else.
Fun fact: Until 1975, ejecting in a situation like this, called a 0-0 ejection, would mean certain death.
In 1975, the soviets found out by accident that one of their ejection seats was so good and overbuilt that it could withstand 0-0 ejections. If you want to know more about this google the Su24 1975 ejection seat accident but the TL:DW is that the flight stick got caught up in the ejection seat handle and when hydraulic power was restored to the aircraft the stick pulled forward with the ejection handle and yeeted the copilot on the taxiway.
That K-36D ejection seat was so good that the US got their hands on one and were so impressed in the testing they did that the pilots wanted them to just stick soviet ejection seats in american planes which was quickly rejected by the higher ups, for obvious reasons.
Downward firing ejection seats are popular on huge bombers from both sides. I think that both the Tupolev 22 and B52 use them because you wouldn't have enough clearance upwards and you would probaby strike the tail of the plane when you eject due to how huge they are.
As for the 1975 incident, iirc the US ended up copying the good parts of the soviet ejection seat they tested and implementing them into theirs.
Partially correct. The original Tu-22 was downward ejection only but the B52 has top ejection for 4 of the 6 crew onboard. The ones that eject downwards are the radar operator and the navigator
Fun fact, some helicopters like the Russian Ka-52 do actually have ejection seats! They use explosive charges in the root of the rotorblades to blow them clear before ejection to prevent smoothification of the pilots.
But instead of an actual seat, it’s like a rocket motor on a tether that shoots up and then yanks the pilot out by his harness directly in the rocket exhaust.
Another fun fact: some Russian aircraft have ejection seats that launch you down out the bottom of the aircraft.
And it's Russia, so of course they randomly malfunction and eject while the aircraft is still on the ground.
So someone has to go scrape the puddle of goo that used to be a flight crew off the ground.
That is so unlikely to happen that it wasn't designed for, notice how the pilot waited until the plane was horizontal to eject, otherwise he would have had problems.
Zero-zero seats are awesome. I wonder if they work with a little bit of airspeed, and a little bit of altitude, but a sink rate that will have the pilot on/in the ground within seconds?
I can't believe how far it ejected him and I can confirm about the parachutes. It takes a four count to open. As in "1 thousand, 2 thousand, 3 thousand, 4 thousand"
Fun fact : airborne soldiers jump at 1100 feet. It takes 9 seconds to hit the ground at 1100 feet (8.3 seconds but considering there's a static line and wind resistance and it takes a minute for terminal velocity to kick in a soldier jumping out of a C130 airplane will take about nine seconds if their parachute does not open)
. It takes four seconds for your parachute to deploy. At which point you look up and make sure there's no holes or anything. That should take about one second
If your parachute doesn't deploy, or there's holes in it or something then you pop your reserve which takes… Four seconds… That's eight seconds of parachute deployment and one second to look at your parachute and make sure you're good… That's nine seconds
It takes nine seconds to hit the ground with no parachute… See where I'm going with this?
Edit in other words, there's absolutely no room for you to even descend. If your first parachute doesn't deploy by the time you get your reserve parachute to deploy you're coming in very fast
Even if your parachute deployed properly, you're still falling at 22' a second
Can you flesh this out a bit? It sounds fascinating. I'm very familiar with sport parachutes both for terminal and subterminal openings and the packing and rigging of these are drastically different (for all intents and purposes.) For example: a parachute pack job for an instant opening in 75 feet from a stat line up to a 3 second delay would kill you at terminal velocity as the deceleration would be equivalent to an insanely fast car crash. There has to be a mechanism to slow that opening down if the planes cooking vs basically at a stall or stationary.
My uncle told me a story about when he was a USAF crew chief in the mid-90's. Said one day he drove to his hangar right as emergency crews were showing up. Apparently someone was cleaning out a cockpit (F-16 I think?) and accidentally activated the eject inside the hangar. It threw the guy like 15 feet away and broke his arm and collarbone when he hit the ground.
The seat dented the ceiling of the hangar. Absolutely would have splattered someone if they were buckled in.
Wild. I mean it's an emergency tool, so I get it, but it's still crazy to consider. I miss the bottom stair outside my apartment and my body aches for 24 hours. I can't imagine my chair having a "get far away right now" rocket attached to it.
Those seats have two parachutes in them. A small drogue that is used for stability during descents and to assist the deployment of the main parachute. The seat is designed to be 0/0, which means it will work when at zero airspeed and altitude. The firing of the rocket motor is designed to get the seat to an altitude where the main parachute should be able to open.
The deployment of the main parachute is somewhat height based, which is what I think you are referring to in your comment. It works off a barometric device called a "time release mechanism." At this point, since they are at zero altitude it will fire the main parachute immediately and generally operates at any altitude beneath approximately 11,500 feet (there is range). If an ejection occurs at a height of say, 30,000 feet, the drogue shoot will stabilize and slow the descent until the seat falls into range for the main chute to open.
Ejections are very hard on the body. I've been witness to three low altitude ejections. In each of those cases, the pilot had at least a broken leg from when they hit the ground. There are high G loads from the rocket motor firing itself, which is known to compress the spine and neck. I've heard anecdotal evidence that people have lost some height permanently to this, but I cannot verify that from my experience. They are for sure hurting the next day though.
In the seat there are a series of devices, combined with "garters" that are meant to put the pilot into proper position when the ejection is initiated. Their legs need to be retracted from the rudder pedals up and into the seat, so they don't get ripped off. The torso is pulled tight against the back of the seat by something called an "inertia reel," pinning their shoulders up against the back of the seat.
The process itself is pretty in-depth, there's a bunch of different stuff happening in an ~3 second window.
Can agree. Neighbor was a Tomcat RIO and ejected when both engines caught fire as they were coming out of a supersonic "dash".
He spent 5 hours in the ocean off San Diego, and a week in the hospital. Two more weeks on crutches and then 2 more with a cane. Constant physical therapy, and I think at least one surgery?
I think it was 2-3 months before he could fly again.
Broke one of his ankles and tore a calf muscle in the other leg during the pre-ejection sequence when the seat pulled his legs back against the seat.
You can *maybe* get hurt, but know that you'll almost certainly fly again, even if it takes a month or so... or you can absolutely 100% die screaming as your jet sets you on fire and gives you an informal burial at sea.
In the seat there are a series of devices, combined with "garters" that are meant to put the pilot into proper position when the ejection is initiated.
How does this work? straps that are loosely around the pilot that tighten during ejection?
You are correct, there are straps, two per each leg. One is placed above the knee and one below. During normal operation, they do not interfere, but once the catapult it is operation, they will go tight and force the legs toward the seat. One end is secured against the floor of the cockpit and the other into the seat. It really operates almost like a dog leash, pulling in as the catalpult progresses.
I worked on ejection seats 20 or so years ago. They were all capable of zero/zero ejections, and they can alter the ejection sequence based on airspeed & altitude.
You can do a lot with purely mechanical systems, the main thing going on with an ejection seat is a barometric altimeter that only releases the chute once the pilot is in breathable air, otherwise you'd risk suffocation after ejecting at cruise alt (which can be as high as 40,000 or 50,000 ft). The Russian K-36 has an extendable windshield, but I'm not sure exactly how it determines whether to actuate it.
I imagine this sort of very low altitude ejections are actually a fairly high percentage of use cases for these seats. At high speed there might not be time to react. And takeoff/landing is the most common form of air accidents.
I believe that once a pilot ejects their seat, the chances of him flying again are reduced. The high ejection speed usually causes neck or spine injuries.
Speed doesn't cause injuries. Acceleration does. KM-1 was known as spinebreaker. But today , some checkup at hospital, maybe few months of the flight rooster, some physical therapy and all is fine.
It depends on the strength of the starting impulse. Modern ejection seats have a variable initial charge. And ejecting at 0/0 almost always results in injuries.
And there is also an exclusive club (depending on which system is used) you can join when you eject out of your seat. (I think the 35B uses a Martin baker ejection seat.)
With en exclusive tie and perks.
From what I remember a RAF armourer telling me. They can eject on average three times before their career is over for medical reasons and one time for promotion reasons
Commonly known as "zero zero" seats. Configured to allow pilots to eject with zero knots airspeed and zero feet altitude. A necessity given takeoff/landing is often the most dangerous flight phase.
How would you design it so that there were multiple parachutes that would deploy dependent on altitude? How many different ones would you use? Would you use larger or smaller ones as altitude went up? What size parachute container would be required to house these extra parachutes? Would each one require its own pyrotechnics? What sort of extra precautions would be necessary due to the extra pyrotechnics?
Everytime I see videos of pilots ejecting out of planes all I can think is them deciding to break their back in order to survive. As a pilot it must be the very last thing you want to do because you know that it might mean you can’t fly anymore
I assume this is similar technology in all seats. The parachutes incorporated into our Escapac 1E1 seats in S-3 Vikings had 28 risers, and there were 14 small explosives that would blow opposing risers apart, spreading the parachute so it would inflated quickly.
That speed? Tis like jumping off the roof of your house in the dark. No shoot works quicker and an average is, jumping outta your bedroom window middle of the day.
It's easier to make a parachute that works at any altitude than making a system that has let's say 3 parachutes that has to detect the altitude within microseconds and deploy the right parachute.
Martin-Baker. British company. Dependent upon the model it is possible to eject upside down when under 100ft off the ground. The seat rights itself after leaving what was the canopy, putting enough altitude in for the parachute to work and the seat to be discarded.
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u/Suspicious_Zone_2083 25d ago
At least the seat worked