
Belgian Air Force F-16 destroyed by fire during maintenance - jsiepkes
https://www.aviation24.be/military-aircraft/belgian-air-component/air-force-f-16-destroyed-maintenance-collateral-damage-second/
======
Jerry2
This reminded me of Taffy Holden, UK's RAF technician, who in 1966
accidentally took off in Lightning after making an error. English Electric
Lightning was one of the fastest fighter jets of its time.

> _The account has been widely published across the internet, but we make no
> apology for running the story here, as it’s a fascinating tale and it’s good
> to hear the original account of how Taffy Holden, an RAF Engineering
> Officer, accidentally selected reheat, then managed to fly several circuits
> in the Lightning jet fighter, position it for an approach and then land it
> with only minor damage. The flight in Taffy’s own words is reproduced in
> full below._

[http://www.historicracer.com/aviation/accidental-fighter-
pil...](http://www.historicracer.com/aviation/accidental-fighter-pilot/)

~~~
cptskippy
That quote makes it sound more deliberate and less a terrifying accident.

The Lightning was a high speed interceptor tasked to shoot down nuclear
bombers, to say it was fast is an understatement.

He wasn't certified to fly that aircraft and was troubleshooting an electrical
problem that couldn't be reproduced in the hanger. So he was taking short
taxis down a closed portion of runway without a canopy. The equivalent of a
car mechanic reving your engine in the parking lot.

The reheater (aka afterburner) on the Lightning was the last position on the
throttle and there was a lock once engaged.

He wasn't having any luck reproducing the issue and so was going faster with
each attempt. He accidentally engaged the reheater and went flying down the
runway.

Before he could manage to disengage the reheater he had to avoid another
aircraft and after that the runway ran out so he had to choose between
crashing and taking off.

Once up it took him 4 approaches to bring it down without a canopy.

------
tschwimmer
I took a look at the US Air Force subreddit[0] and lots of people who maintain
these jets are skeptical as to the accidental nature of this incident.
According to several comments there are many physical failsafes that would
need to be deactivated in order for this to happen. The incident occurred in
Belgium but it’s hard to believe their F-16s are significantly different.

[0]
[https://reddit.com/r/AirForce/comments/9nyorn/belgium_techni...](https://reddit.com/r/AirForce/comments/9nyorn/belgium_technician_sets_off_an_f16_cannon_during/)

~~~
Joeri
The military leadership in belgium also commented that it had to be a very
unlucky combination of circumstances, but they didn’t want to say more without
further investigation.

~~~
wiz21c
Note that the belgiam army wants to buy new war planes sooner or later and
that the whole buying procedure has been affected by mismanagment, unclear
pressures, etc. (as reported in the local news). So this could be done on
intent to discredit the F16, etc.

------
AlexanderDhoore
As a Belgian I find this hilarious. This might be the most Belgian thing ever.

By the way they are investigating whether this was an accident or on purpose.
The chances of this being an accident are quite small.

~~~
ElBarto
I find it sad that European airforces buy so many US planes.

~~~
_delirium
US-designed, but partly Belgian-manufactured. These things are always
political/economic horsetrading, and as part of the deal, Belgium got one of
the F-16 production lines placed in Charleroi:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Dynamics_F-16_Fighting...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Dynamics_F-16_Fighting_Falcon#Into_production)

~~~
ElBarto
Well, when the news is all about security and Chinese hacks and untrustworthy
hardware I find it strange to rely 100% on foreign hardware for one's
airforce.

Europe isn't an American colony. If anything it should be the other way round.

~~~
refurb
Considering how little the EU spends on the military compared to the US, it
shouldn’t be surprising at all.

~~~
ElBarto
That's a strawman to the point...

------
hnarn
I might be stating the obvious here, but why is maintenance work being done on
a fighter jet that is loaded with sharp ammunition? You wouldn't do
maintenance on a gun when it's loaded, why would you do it on a multi million
dollar fighter jet?

~~~
toomanybeersies
And yet people still manage to accidentally shoot themselves when cleaning
their firearms.

Usually it's a series of failures that lead to such an incident, rather than
one single critical failure. Failsafes aren't failproofs.

~~~
davidgould
Not really.

Base on years of using and cleaning guns for hunting and target shooting and
from reading several hundred reports of gun cleaning "accidents", "gun
cleaning accident" is polite fiction for "I shot myself (or someone else!)
playing with my gun". Although, to be fair, some of them are suicides and
possibly the occasional murder.

Normally guns only need cleaning if they have been fired or have somehow
gotten wet or contaminated. The procedure to clean a gun goes like this:

1) Remove ammunition 2) Partially disassemble gun (depending on model) 3)
Scrub a cleaning rod and brush through the barrel and chamber 4) Reassemble

Removing the ammunition has to happen, otherwise you cannot run the brush
though the barrel because the ammunition is in the way. So shooting yourself
while cleaning a gun because you didn't know it was loaded is like driving off
without your car keys. Not too plausible.

On the other hand, it's pretty easy to have an accident playing with a gun,
and apparently shooting yourself is deeply embarrassing so it's not uncommon
to lie about "I was cleaning it". I don't know why the police accept this
story, just a social nicety I guess.

Of course this story works best if the "accident" happens in the home. A
surprisingly common variation in cases where the gun owner shoots themselves
in a parked car or suchlike (often with a newly purchased gun) is that a
"black man ran up/drove by" and shot them for no reason. Sometimes the
assailant was "wearing black clothes" and/or "driving a "black SUV". The
police tend to be more skeptical about this although not always. [0] [1]

[0] [http://www.startribune.com/wounded-st-kate-s-security-
office...](http://www.startribune.com/wounded-st-kate-s-security-officer-who-
lied-about-being-shot-said-gunman-was-black/444452013/) [1]
[https://www.nbcwashington.com/news/local/Police-White-Man-
Bl...](https://www.nbcwashington.com/news/local/Police-White-Man-Blamed-Self-
inflicted-Gunshot-at-Virginia-Motel-on-Black-Men--479895953.html)

~~~
daveFNbuck
I agree that shooting yourself while cleaning a gun sounds impossible, but
there are enough guns in this country that the occasional absurd mistake is
going to happen. You could accidentally shoot yourself before completing step
1. You could accidentally shoot yourself during steps 2 or 3 if you skip step
1.

The brush won't go through the barrel if ammunition is in the way, but that
doesn't mean the cleaner won't keep trying.

~~~
vsl
Nope. Unloading is a separate step from cleaning, and shooting _yourself_
during it would be incredibly hard (shooting something else may and does
happen after a series of serious mistakes). The gun is _physically incapable_
of shooting beyond commencing step 2. If the brush can’t get through due to
being loaded, the obstacle is at the very beginning of the barrel and visible
by eye. Even if you were a complete moron and kept pushing at it, that simply
can’t fire the bullet. It’s basic mechanics of how a gun works.

I agree with OP: this is polite fiction. You can hurt yourself during cleaning
with some guns (a spring snapping on your fingers, for example), but shoot
yourself? Nah.

------
chx
[https://www.resetera.com/threads/technician-accidentally-
fir...](https://www.resetera.com/threads/technician-accidentally-
fires-f-16-cannon-and-destroys-another-f-16-on-the-ground-in-
belgium.74660/page-2#post-13766279) here's someone claiming to be an F-16
weapons technician posting and -- they needed to do something stupid or the
weight-on-wheels switch needed to malfunction.

~~~
Jerry2
> _they needed to do something stupid or the weight-on-wheels switch needed to
> malfunction._

Actually, the F-16 has a switch to override the 'weight on wheels' (WOW)
safety for the weapons. It's used for doing checks and maintenance on the
ground. Switch was probably flipped and it did what it was supposed to do. You
can see the procedure here:

[http://aviationandaccessories.tpub.com/TM-1-1510-224-10/css/...](http://aviationandaccessories.tpub.com/TM-1-1510-224-10/css/TM-1-1510-224-10_207.htm)

~~~
metaphor
The reference cited is from the wrong airframe.

The correct manual for Belgian F-16s will be either a GS (general system;
theory of operations) or JG (job guide; step-by-step procedural instructions)
technical order of the form T.O. 1F-16AM-2- _x_ where _x_ = [system][GS or
JG]-[subsystem]-[manual].

If memory serves correct, F-16 WOW switch override is strictly an external
affair and cannot be performed from the cockpit.

~~~
bitwalker
It has to be done from outside the cockpit, but is not unusual as a
prerequisite step for a variety of avionics systems tests and repairs (source:
I'm an ex-USAF F-16C/D avionics maintainer). They may have had it overridden
for a check, or if deliberate, done so prior to entering the cockpit.

~~~
metaphor
Thanks for corroborating. Former 2A3x2 back in the day as well, albeit
assigned to the F-117 after Sheppard and never toured Osan/Kunsan, so F-16
details were all but lost in the details of life after service.

------
tragomaskhalos
A minor mishap compared to a similar inadvertent weapons incident aboard USS
Forrestal -
[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/1967_USS_Forrestal_fire](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/1967_USS_Forrestal_fire)

------
rzzzwilson
> fires canon and blows up F16

Though why the Belgian Air Force fired a minor cleric for this incident goes
unanswered.

------
curiousgal
That has got to be the most expensive fuckup by a technician ever.

~~~
roma1n
Not sure. An ariane 4 rocket exploded due to a leftover cleaning rag in a
water line. I would guess the launcher + payload price would top the price of
an F16?

~~~
jpatokal
Two F16s were damaged, although it's not clear from the article if the other
one is also a write-off.

------
aetherspawn
I thought these sorts of planes would have a safety.

And if the safety is designed in such a way without i.e. interlocks and such
that you can fire off guns accidentally by poking around in the
wires/connectors, that's a little sad.

~~~
smdyc1
Now I don't know about fighters, but I used to work on C-130s. Countermeasure
systems (flare and chaff) rely on a weight on wheels microswitch completing a
circuit when the aircraft is in the air, safety pins being removed from a
panel to arm the system, an on switch, and a guarded switch being activated
before the system can be used.

Now sometimes the weight on wheels switches need to be bypassed for testing a
wide range of aircraft systems. Perhaps the aircraft was on jacks (tyre
replacement?) or some sort of EMI occurred... But ultimately there really is a
great deal of safety layers that had to be compromised for this to happen,
including human factors.

Like with software development, you can't predict every possible action of
your users (air or ground crew), and sooner or later you'll encounter an edge
case nobody had considered.

------
gear54rus
Woah, what kind of burst was that? Surely it couldn't have lasted more than a
second or so (while the jump-scare wears off of the technician :) yet the
plane is torched. Thought they are a bit more resilient.

~~~
Steve44
I don't know the exact variant but the F16s have/had a 6 barrel 20mm canon
which fires about 100 shells per second. That's a bit more than a few rounds
from small arms and more than plenty to destroy the 'target' aircraft. It
possibly only took one or two hits to do that damage.

------
pingec
Why would such a plane even allow firing a gun when not in air?

~~~
dragonwriter
Because any system which attempted to prevent that would have a nonzero chance
of preventing shots while in the air, and it's quite easy to imagine the cost
of that being much greater than what is saved by the intended effect.

That's not to say that there shouldn't be safety systems that would prevent
accidental firing, just that “never shoot if system thinks we're on the
ground” is very likely not a good one.

~~~
chx
But there _is_ such a system, there's a weight-on-wheels switch they needed to
override. Source: [https://www.resetera.com/threads/technician-accidentally-
fir...](https://www.resetera.com/threads/technician-accidentally-
fires-f-16-cannon-and-destroys-another-f-16-on-the-ground-in-
belgium.74660/page-2#post-13766279) and many more.

------
rurban
Headline should be "by friendly fire". The technician shot with the cannon at
the 2 other planes.

Similar to the old story when Arnold Schwarzenegger stole a tank and went on a
rampage, but then was protected by his protégé and got away with it.

------
major505
Well, if you gonna mess with somethnig that spits 6000 rounds per min, you
better be damn sure what the hell you are doing.

The good news is now the guy can almost qualify as an ace. He just need 3 more
planes shot.

------
beilabs
Would love to reead the technicians resume after this.

2018: successfully targeted and destroyed a F-16 with a second F-16 also
grounded. Only person in Europe to do so.

Would you be proud of that entry?

~~~
Steve44
> Only person in Europe to do so

In 1982 an RAFG Phantom shot down an RAFG Jaguar. Not on the ground
admittedly, but still quite an incident.

[https://aviation-safety.net/wikibase/wiki.php?id=55364](https://aviation-
safety.net/wikibase/wiki.php?id=55364)

> Shot down 35 miles NE of Bruggen, West Germany by a Sidewinder missile
> accidentally fired from 92 Squadron Phantom FGR2 XV422. The pilot ejected
> safely. The master armament switch in the Phantom had not been taped in the
> ‘safe’ position and the pilot inadvertently rendered ‘live’ one of the two
> main safely switches. The pilot and navigator of the Phantom were court
> martialed and found guilty of offences of neglect.

------
ccnafr
I'm wondering why they even do maintenance on loaded guns. Are they stupid
difficult to unload? Did the worker screw up during unloading?

------
salex89
Well, at least they know the gun works...

~~~
sebazzz
Not to mention the power of a gun. An aircraft is powerless when it is hit, so
obviously the only defense is not being hit at all.

------
johnchristopher
There were a lot of low altitude training over the south of Belgium this
summer.

Maybe some people are exhausted.

------
Improvotter
My landlord works on military aircrafts as well, maybe he wasn't working on
these specifically. But I'm gonna ask him whether he knows the people. Should
be interesting haha.

------
kyriakos
why was it loaded?

------
jbverschoor
So tempting to make dutch - belgian jokes now

~~~
jacquesm
It is ok, just tell them once.

------
chillidoor
Well, I guess they now know how effective the cannon is...

This is going to be one hell of a rough couple of days for the technician(s)
involved.

------
goldenkey
Debugging..hmm..pretty important stuff when your guns aren't mocked.

------
anonymfus
In Russian media it's always portrayed that a professional pilot must be in
the cockpit during any maintenance operations to avoid exactly such things.

~~~
vinay427
I wouldn't be surprised if technicians trained on a specific piece of
equipment are more broadly skilled at operating the controls than a pilot or
other operator.

