Skyraider is back home

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Skyraider is back home

Archive 2016

Thursday, 14 January 2016

The 5th September 2015, Bernard Vurpillot was ferrying the Skyraider F-AZFN to the Cambrai airshow miles away from Melun when he heard the big Wright R-3350 suddenly misfiring and detonate, then flames coming out from the air scoop just in front of the windshield.

With coolness and professionalism and in a few seconds, Bernard made the only good decision that was to land the aircraft in a field that was ploughed the stubble just in front of him and not try to reach the nearby airfield of Soissons.

Quickly evaluating the state of the ground stiff enough after an exceptionally dry summer and the length available he decided to land the big bird wheels down.That was the right decision as the aircraft was landed safely, without any breakage, without any injury to the pilot, and to the relief of friends and the owner of the plane.

Here comes an amusing anecdote : just stepping out of the aircraft, Bernard found a horseshoe on the ground… in fact, this is quite normal as there are lot of horses in the nearby “Maison Neuve” farm.

The Lienart family who own the farm were the first people to welcome Bernard. That farm is not far from the Soissons airfield, where the famed “Escadrille Lafayette” was based during the First World War.

Then came de task to find the reason of the engine breakdown, hopping a possible take off from the field after repair. Unfortunately it appeared impossible as the engine was badly damaged with several pistons and valves broken in it. The reason of the break-in was found to be a crack in the left magneto distributor that generated an erratic ignition resulting detonation and misfiring observed by Bernard… so the engine has now to be replaced.

The Lienart family offered generously to keep the Skyraider into an agricultural hangar, as long as the time to find a transporter able to bring the aircraft back to Melun. It was a complicated operation to get three administrative authorisations to carry such a huge load by road through three regions (Aisne, Seine and Marne and Val de Marne).

Before this was done it was necessary to remove two blades of the big 13 feet of diameter propeller and both outside the folding device part of the wings. This was imposed to keep the height of the aircraft under a certain height so to be able to pass under the bridges. This was done in the end of December.

Then came the day… the day of the way back to Melun for the big bird. Every body in the “Maison neuve” farm with their attentive dogs were watching the skilled crane driver carefully keep the airplane over the gate and the wall surrounding the farmyard to depose it gently on the cradle of the trailer.

It took about 70 miles to reach Melun before to remove the wounded Skyraider were another team waited to drive it into the FFW hangar.

It remains now to remove the broken engine and replace it by another overhauled one. We’ll keep you aware of the following operations/

PS. we arte gratefull to Ailes Soissonaises as most of the photo report comes from people of this association. We inform you of their great 25 th anniversary of their airfield show the 12^th June 2016.