While we're on the subject it's worth mentioning too that the left hand cockpit side skins were all crushed flat against the structure, while the right hand ones were blown outwards (fairly sure I have that right- Bill?)
Yes, the pic's are all there in the diary archive for anyone who can be bothered to trawl through it but that's essentially what happened, which is why we have so much original material down that side and bits missing from the other. Another amazing effect of the speed and severity of the roll is the fact that the
left-hand cockpit frame forward of F-17 separated completely, having failed forward of the F-17 vertical frame tube, without penetrating the water surface at all and passed completely under the rolling cockpit to be spat out the
right-hand side and go airborne again for another 130m until you see it splash down here in the foreground. Remember that in this shot,
K7 has stopped and is facing almost back down the lake.
By the way - the splash in the middle is the steering box and column, RH cockpit rail, instrument panel crossmember, F-18 and F-20 bulkheads all rolled in a ball and subsequently lifted by the RN dive team in 67.
Splashes.jpg
By the way, I've lost count of the number of knowledgeable individuals who tell me with absolute conviction that what you see hitting the water here is actually the front spar. I wouldn't mind so much if is wasn't public knowledge that we'd taken a boat bristling with sonar, ROV and diving technology and really found these items and dragged them back into daylight and now have them lying about our workshop.
It's
NOT the spar, OK?
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I'm only a plumber from Cannock...
"As to reward, my profession is its own reward;" Sherlock Holmes.
'It ain't what they call you, it's what you answer to.' W.C. Fields.