What is the strangest damage to an aircraft that you have ever seen?

2015-08-05T11:07:33-04:00

What is the weirdest damage you have seen or, most extensive repair you've had to perform?

Response by SSgt Private RallyPoint Member made Aug 5 at 2015 11:33 AM

2015-08-05T11:33:22-04:00

This happened in 2001 at Eglin AFB. Security Forces troop ran his squad car under an F-15 on the ramp. The rumors on how he did it flew. Some say he was hotdogging the car, others say he dropped his cell phone.

No injuries, besides the car and the F15 that was just minding its own business.

Response by MSgt Robert Pellam made Aug 5 at 2015 12:12 PM

2015-08-05T12:12:00-04:00

Stationed at Kirtland AFB, NM. We had a C-130 hit what I assume is a couple of Vultures. One put a dent about the size of a bowling ball above and left of the wind screen. The other hit right below the center of the windscreen, punched through the fuselage, and disintegrated through the flight gauges spraying the flight crew with carnage. Plane landed safely. Fixed at Kirtland.

Response by LtCol Robert Quinter made Aug 5 at 2015 12:38 PM

2015-08-05T12:38:12-04:00

I once did an emergency extract of a Recon team in VN, There was no place to land so I backed the aircraft into a hillside and let down until I felt solid enough for the team to jump on the ramp. During the loading process, I was mentally congratulating myself on the stability of the hover. When the team was all aboard, I lifted and returned them to their base. On the post flight inspection, we found an 18 inch hole in the underside of the aircraft where a tree trunk had punched through during the landing. Gave some extra stability in the hover and the metal shop had a good time with it.

Response by MSgt J D McKee made Aug 5 at 2015 2:36 PM

2015-08-05T14:36:57-04:00

An F-111 that had (ok, this was in 1974-sh, so this is from long-ago memory) a goose hit the (I believe) left side windshield. Don't recall any injuries, probably were some. That was in my first few months, so nobody really gave me any details, I was an AIC. Other than that, as an NCO and senior NCO, picked up or was present at (one was lost at sea) 5 F111 crashes. I won't put the location here in case relatives see, but one in particular was a god-awful mess where the AC apparently flew almost straight down into the ground and a flock of sheep at close to Mach 1. Pilots didn't get out. I guess they thought they were in cloud but it was fog instead? No clue why, really. There were no repairs, but they would have been extensive and probably still ongoing. This was in the 1980's.

Response by LTC Stephen C. made Aug 5 at 2015 7:54 PM

2015-08-05T19:54:11-04:00

SSgt Private RallyPoint Member, the B-17 "All American" sustained some of the most significant damage that I've seen to an aircraft, yet was able to continue flying and return to base. Occurred in 1943. I've attached a link to the story.

http://www.warbirdsnews.com/warbird-articles/wwiis-b-17-all-american-separating-fact-fiction.html

WWII’s B-17 “All American” Separating Fact and Fiction

We got this email in our inbox the other day, purporting to tell the story of the Boeing B-17 Flying Fortress, "All American." The story, accompanied with some incredible pictures, told of the plane, mortally wounded, getting her crew home safely. We were pretty sure we had seen this email, sent from a friend (who got it from a friend, who got it from a friend, ad infinitum) before at some time in the past, but reading it over, some things...

Response by SFC Joe S. Davis Jr., MSM, DSL made Aug 5 at 2015 9:55 PM

2015-08-05T21:55:48-04:00

SSgt Private RallyPoint Member great question. Well there I was in Baghdad, Iraq in April 2003. After the Airport (BIAP) was secured. I was delivering supplies to BIAP, I notice a bombed out transport aircraft cut in half. I couldn't believe it. U.S. Forces took it to the Republican Guard.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2003_invasion_of_Iraq

2003 invasion of Iraq - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

380,000 troops[7] United States: 192,000 troops[8]United Kingdom: 45,000Australia: 2,000Poland: 194[9] Peshmerga: 70,000[10]

Response by SSgt Alex Robinson made Aug 5 at 2015 10:27 PM

2015-08-05T22:27:46-04:00

Lots of bird strikes. Seagulls and Pelicans.

Response by PO1 William "Chip" Nagel made Aug 6 at 2015 2:29 AM

2015-08-06T02:29:22-04:00

Weirdest I remember was when CND Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament in England snuck onto base and dumped a butt load of Blood Red Paint on an Aircraft.

Response by Jordan Gaudard made Aug 6 at 2015 10:53 AM

2015-08-06T10:53:37-04:00

While I was in Afghanistan last year they moved the T-Walls so they could repair parts of the runway. One of the C-10 units didn't read the NOTAMs and I'll leave the rest to your imagination. Luckily they didn't shut down the entire airfield for too long.

If you consider UAVs aircraft, we launched one when the parachute deployed and it nose dived right off base. Another time we had a faulty fuel pump, landed in a soccer field and somehow it was in a perfect pile with the booms crossed, everything sweep up tightly and started on fire.

Response by MSgt Dwyane Watson made Aug 6 at 2015 11:16 AM

2015-08-06T11:16:36-04:00

Being a "tin Bender" for 24 years I have seen all kinds of damage. When I was a reservist at Wright- Pat in the early 90s a F-4 hit two deer. When stationed at Davis-Monthan we had a A-10 strike and kill a coyote. When stationed at Travis I have had not bird strikes but Pterodactyl strikes on C-141s and C-5s. When you investigate the "possible bird strike" and you see the talon still wedged between the pylon and wing and the talon is bigger than your hand, all you can do is just stand back and say "damn!" As for extensive damage we discovered extensive corrosion on a C-141 were 40 square feet of skin had to be replaced as well as the stringers and ribs. One of the dumbest things we had to fix on our "off time" was when a F-86 pilot practicing for an airshow bloody forgot to put his landing gear down and decided it would be really cool to belly land a perfectly good aircraft. Lucky for the aircraft owner my sheetmetal guys were dying to get their hands on his aircraft and fix it for gratis. Many more stories are out there!!!!!!!

Response by LCDR Private RallyPoint Member made Aug 6 at 2015 2:14 PM

2015-08-06T14:14:40-04:00

"Heavy Rain" damage on engine intake lips on an EA-6B Prowler. More commonly referred to as hail.

Made the intakes look like Swiss cheese.

Response by MSgt J D McKee made Aug 7 at 2015 10:41 AM

2015-08-07T10:41:45-04:00

I just remembered another one. I was Security most of my career, but had about 2 years mid-career as a Firefighter at Eglin AFB. We got a call that an F15 was landing with damage. When the plane landed, there was part of an ejector seat hanging out of a hole it had punched in the bottom fuselage, and a very small dent. The seat part was a rail or something, was sort of an "I" beam about 2 in in cross-section and what I could see was 2 or 3 ft long, but no idea how much was up inside the plane. Here ends what I actually know about this incident, we were told there were 2 F15's dogfighting over the Gulf and one of them ejected and hit the other one. Anyone heard of this and know what actually happened?

Response by SMSgt Private RallyPoint Member made Aug 8 at 2015 12:30 AM

2015-08-08T00:30:58-04:00

I have 3 stories. While deployed to Pakistan a Navy F-18 landed with his canopy smashed and the hose still attached to his refueling point. When the hose would not detach the pilot had to get it to break off the C-130. When it broke off it smashed the canopy making for a long cold flight to Jacobabad. Same location a CH-47 came in with no front wheels due to an accident in Afghanistan. Our Fire Trucks provided light for the Soldiers to hold up a stack of pallets for the CH-47 to land on. It was quite the thing to watch. While stationed at Cannon an F-16 went to take off and had to abort takeoff due to panels, parts and pieces falling off. This jet was just put back into service and someone did not do their job to ensure the jet was air worthy. A lot of heads rolled for that one.

Response by CCMSgt Private RallyPoint Member made Aug 17 at 2015 3:17 AM

2015-08-17T03:17:48-04:00

Weapons was lowering a drum in the F16 and it caused major damage to the upper intake. Plus same time QA decided to run a crash axe through the wing destyoing two wing spars and skin. We pulled a stop sign off the road and slapped some saaalant and speed rape on it and told then to fly it.

Response by MSgt J D McKee made Jul 28 at 2016 1:05 PM

2016-07-28T13:05:53-04:00

This one is from long ago memory and maybe not the whole story at the time, either. I was on a Crash crew at the Eglin AFB fire department main station. We responded to an aircraft emergency and found an F15 with a small hole in the underside and a metal rail hanging out of another hole of about the same size, and a small dent in the same general area. Story we got was that two F15's were dogfighting over the gulf and one ejected into the bottom of the other one. Would have been 80 or 81. If someone else has a better memory or the whole story I'd like to hear it, never did that I remember.

Other than that, at RAF Upper Heyford in the early '70s I saw an F111 which had hit, I think it was, a goose. It did a truly amazing amount of damage to the very thick and strong canopy, but i think the nav or pilot whichever, lived and just had a little damage.

Response by MSgt Dwyane Watson made Aug 5 at 2016 10:06 PM

2016-08-05T22:06:37-04:00

I was stationed at Travis in the 90's and 1 of our C-141's had a bird strike. Sometimes all you see is a little blood and a smear, but this time it looked like a Pterodactyl hit the #3 leading edge! Part of a leg and talon was left...this was the biggest talon I had ever seen, we think a California condor took out the pylon.We had to replace most of the leading edge ribs and all the skin. Wow, it was a big bird.

Response by MSgt Private RallyPoint Member made Feb 28 at 2017 3:36 PM

2017-02-28T15:36:26-05:00

I watched a B-52 come in with the flap hanging from one actuator. How that thing was still hanging on is beyond me. Amazingly the surrounding damage was as bad as I had expected.
We also had to have depot come in and repair the nose of a B-52 that had been hit by five geese. We assisted on this repair.

Response by MSgt Private RallyPoint Member made Feb 28 at 2017 3:52 PM

2017-02-28T15:52:41-05:00

I forgot two f-15 stories. When I was in Korea, 83-83, we heard about an f-15 coming in with no nose gear. So, I ran over to watch this pilot bring it in. He came down on both mains and rose it out to almost the end of the runway. The nose was starting to come down and then he punched. Slammed the nose into the ground. The aircraft quickly came to holt. I was just glad I was not working flight-line in Korea and had to deal with that, but it was cool to watch.

When I was in Saudi Arabia, I had to go over to McDonald Douglas to get a part for an f-15. Inside they had an f-15 on jigs. The Mechanic told me a Saudi pilot had punched because one of our female air traffic controllers had responded to his call. Really? If that wasn't astonishing enough, they were rebuilding that aircraft. I'm a sheetmetal guy thinking, you gotta be kidding me.

Response by SFC William H. made Feb 28 at 2017 4:02 PM

2017-02-28T16:02:20-05:00

Lightning strike just behind pilots cabin on flight from Panama to San Antonio.......Can you imagine what those pilots were thinking......I'm still here, so they did a good job!

Response by SFC Private RallyPoint Member made Mar 1 at 2017 9:33 AM

2017-03-01T09:33:31-05:00

Ive seen white a few of them since as rotary we deal with some awkward landing areas.

1. AH-64 lands on tree stump ripping Doppler faring, mount, and antenna off
2. CH-47 landing on raised platform comes in too low and strikes platform (Concrete) cracking several formers in the floor
3. UH-60 called forward due to a small ditch in LZ landing on a small COP at night (under NVGS) and rotor blades strike T-walls taking 4feet off the rotor blades
4. UH-60 landing on a jersey barrier buckling most of the tail
5. RPG struck stabilator of AH-64 and found on post flight inspection lodged in fairing below #2 engine
6. UH-60 attempts dust landing at night way too hot and pancakes on the ground. When returns to the FOB you can see all the sheetmetal looking like crumpled and flattened Tin-foil

And of course plenty of Small Arms holes

Response by A1C Riley Sanders made Oct 8 at 2019 9:01 AM

2019-10-08T09:01:10-04:00

Blown apart from Rockets & Mortars / shot full of holes from ground fire

Response by Capt Private RallyPoint Member made Oct 9 at 2019 5:29 PM

2019-10-09T17:29:35-04:00

Well, there was that one time that a B-52 lost its entire vertical stabilizer, forcing the crew to make an emergency landing.

https://www.popularmechanics.com/military/aviation/news/a27584/b-52-landed-without-a-tail-fin/

The Time a B-52 Landed Without a Tail Fin

A midair accident meant the crew had to learn to fly without a tail fin—and fast.

Response by SSgt Brad Lyon made Apr 7 at 2021 8:43 PM

2021-04-07T20:43:13-04:00

While stationed in Germany, got called out when a C-5 ran its T tail into the vert of a civilian 747. Tore a 1/4 off the T-tail and half way through the vert.