Well, that sucks
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FyfK1tea3zo

That sucked..

He is pissed, rightfully so.

I wonder if video from the other
aircraft will be released..??

I imagine it would be just blue sky and a glare shield at the bottom, a sudden camera jiggle, and then just a different view of the sky.

 

OH BOY...

That could have been a whole lot worse.  

somebody is trying to kill him

not the crash from last week where a plane took off from reno, got about 100ft elev. and put the plane down in the parking lot killing 2 in plane.

A bail bondsman was one of the deceased.

Does the pilot not look in front on the runway ?

Tail draggers.  You really can't see the runway until the tail comes up.

He got damn lucky. Another foot or two over and he'd be dead.

The other side of the video:

https://youtu.be/kVnRkSSN-T8

For the Formula 1 class at Reno, their rules state something to the effect that during the start, if you experience some sort of malfunction, you open the canopy and the spotters are supposed to stop the take off of the other planes to prevent something like this from happening.

Obviously someone wasn't watching or the message to stop the start of the race wasn't relayed.  Thom was extremely lucky this didn't turn out worse...

Just in case the CFIs among us needed video evidence of the forward blindness of taildraggers....




That said...glad Thom's ok. Poor guy seems to have terrible luck at Reno.

Do these races start from the takeoff roll?

From a safety perspective, its just a terrible idea to start like that.  I watched in horror as an F4U ran into an F8F (might've been the other way around) at Oshkosh in the late 1990s.  There was a breakdown in communications and while the F8F started his runup on the runway, the F4U started his takeoff roll.  Ended in a fiery mess.

Biplane and F1 are a race horse start. T-6, jet, and Unlimited are air starts.

Any time more than one aircraft is operated on the same runway there is opportunity for unforeseen conflict.
Engines quit, tires blow out, brakes fail, pilots loose control, winds gust, radios fail, pilots miss radio calls, shit, in general, can and does happen.

Axe me how I know.    I did formation takeoffs and landings in the military because that's' what we did. I was lucky like Thom and survived a similar event as a civilian.

I'm older and wiser /more skeerd and don't share runways anymore.

My guess is that a different start will be done next year.

that was an interesting crash, after reading Katheryn's report and seeing that the bondsman was a very heavy guy, I calculated the W&B of that Turbo archer every way possible and with just enough fuel to make it to their destination and no matter how you arranged the Px on board they were operating outside of the envelope by a decent margin.

Here are my calcs

Why werent radios being used?

You're way on the low side, weight wise.   Article says the one guy weighed 400lbs.  From peeking around online, I'm guessing the pilot was around 190-210.  That's nearly 600lbs in the front seat alone.  Let's be nice and guess the woman was around 140.  That puts the load at at least 740lbs of just people.  However, the generic useful load of a PA-28R-201T Turbo Arrow III is 1237lbs.  That leaves 497lbs for fuel.  83 gallons.  Full load is 72 gallons.  Max gross is 2900.

I'm guessing even with the really big guy, they were within weight limits.  I didn't feel like calculating CG, but it is possible they were forward of the limit if he was in the front seat.  The pilot was newish, less than 3 years since issuance on his license, but he was instrument and multi- rated so he must have had a real interest.  

I think you made your calculations based on an Archer, not a Turbo Arrow.  I'm wondering if the other passenger, a wanted criminal who was being taken into custody, had anything to do with it.....