Message posted by BoomerFrom47 on September 18, 2011 at 11:22:12 PST:

Here's a photo of the trim tab coming off. I noticed yesterday, that it is completely gone in later photos. At the high speed of the race, a P-51 requires a lot of nose-down trim. Sudden removal of that tab results in massive nose-up force. I'm sure the pilot was unconscious from the time of the sharp pullup. His Mayday call must have been the first second he felt something wrong. This is why his head can't be seen in the canopy in the side views, and all control surfaces are neutral during the dive. I think that the high G forces caused the tail wheel to extend.

Here's a story about the same thing happening in 1998, but that time, the plane stabilized in a climb, and the pilot woke up at 9,000 feet. The photo of it shows that only the tab sheet metal broke off, not the actuator.
http://www.warbird.com/voodoo.html

In Reply to: Air racer crashes at Reno posted by Ron on September 16, 2011 at 16:41:32 PST:

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