The History Channel: Bluebird The Curse of Campbell

[sheppane]

I think is is entirely reasonable to say that Donald knew virtually every detail about the handling characteristics of K7. He was effectively a high calibre test pilot, who could sense the slightest behaviour changes and report them in real time. The fact that when the boat pitched up on run 1, it would have been approx 4.5 degree's from the horizontal, and apparent to its pilot both from a visual sense and from the way the boat responded in terms of vibration and its interaction with the water surface. DMC had already 'been there, seen it, done it' in 1956 at 295 mph and I find it inconceivable that he would not have been aware of Bluebird's brief partial flight of 0.7 seconds and several hundred feet on the first run.

His abilities to drive on the limit were immense. That is why he got records that others would not perhaps have managed. He was, in my considered opinion, a driver almost without equal

Nothing I ever say in this regard is said lightly, or without the benefit of considerable thought. The program could have maybe put it better, but the thrust of their argument seems valid.

[Renegadenemo]

Hang on a minute here... are we talking about the same Donald? The consummate showman. Now I'm not the DMC afficianado many think I ought to be but even I have heard his on-board commentaries on other runs whether it be in the car of the boat when he shouts about being at the limits of control and how difficult and dangerous it all is and yet, on this occasion as he has what is arguably the nearest miss of his record breaking career, he says bugger all?
Come on - he either didn't notice his 0.7 second departure into uncontrolled flight or it wasn't worth mentioning. He certainly had something to say about it on the way back!
And as for him being a high-calibre test pilot, I'd argue that anecdotal evidence suggests that it was everyone else - Leo with his sand bags, Ken with his lead ingots - who diagnosed and solved the various handling and performance issues while Donald scratched his head (or rather shook it despondently as he walked up the jetty).That's not the work of a high-calibre test pilot. An astonishingly brave and determined individual, definitely, but let's not get too starry eyed.

We're in a position of great responsibility here, holding the pieces of a history under scrutiny, and allowing a TV programme to set speculation in stone is not clever.

[ace_chris]

Was there a mention of the card game on 3rd Jan in the curse of campbell? Donald Campbell was a brave man, unquestionably, but ultimately he WAS a showman. Lets not forget, the whole purpose of the '66 attempt was to raise his profile and attract sponsorship for the supersonic land speed record attempt.

Based on the weeks of bad luck, crap weather and negative publicity experienced in Coniston, is it not unreasonable to assume that anyone, who felt they were 5 seconds away from achieiving the record (and associated publicity and future sponsorship) would not have thought $%*& it I'm going for it? Its documented that everything was mortgaged up to the hilt, there literally was no money left so of course he would go for it.

Perhaps he felt he could 'get away with it' on the return run like the Lake Eyre '64 attempt when the tyres were shot and he was literally riding on the knfe edge of disaster?

With some of the recent theories coming to light, legally, does it mean a new inquest into the accident and death of Donald Campbell on 4th January will need to be held?

[f1steveuk]

I tend to side with Neil here I'm afraid. Not from the position of a DC anorak, but from someone who has spoken to those people that have been mentioned (the problem solvers) and from the point of view of someone who has done considerable testing work in racing cars and spoken to those who race and test, right up to F1.

Whereas Leo may well have suggested and then attcahed sand bags, it was DC, during the debrief, that explained the problem he was encountering, perhaps not in full engineering terms, but still describing what it was he was feeling, seeing and sensing, that could allow Leo, or Ken to suggest/try solutions.

As an example, one Michael Schumacher is very highly respected as an F1 driver, he is touted as "THE" test driver, yet when I interviewed him in 1996, he did not know it was the airflow UNDER the aerofoils that sucked the car down on to the track, he thought it was the air traveling over the top that deflected the car down! (He asked to shoot that bit again so as not to appear "a bit of a prat"!!). Yet his feedback from the cockpit allows his team to suggest and make adjusments. As is clear, he may not do it with the correct knowledge, or engineering terminology, but he DOES describe it accurately.

DC would know the difference between a "normal" run, and one where abnormal things had occurred. His description of the August '56 'flight' was; " she was bouncing about, then, for a few seconds, smooth, and no banging about, just engine noise. The BANG, followed by all theat vibration and bouncing". Even if Leo hadn't witnessed this from the middle of the course, it's not hard to see that even though DC hadn't realised he had flown, it's pretty obvious that is what he is describing, and next time it happened he knew it too, to the point where it was a thrw away comment, in the bar, ours afterwards. The juggling act of reducing hydrodynamic drag, by using aerdynamic lift, is a very very fine one, but one K7 managed most of the time, I suspect there may have been many many "flight of the Bluebird", sadly, just one very large one!

[Mike Bull]

The program could have maybe put it better, but the thrust of their argument seems valid.

'Their' argument?! Isn't this run analysis yours and Keith Mitchell's work?!

Another goof in the doco- they had Donald returning to Coniston in September '66, not November.

[sheppane]

The program could have maybe put it better, but the thrust of their argument seems valid.

'Their' argument?! Isn't this run analysis yours and Keith Mitchell's work?!

Another goof in the doco- they had Donald returning to Coniston in September '66, not November.

The analysis in the book in indeed our work, and we are very comfortable with it. The program, which did not cover the analysis in any significant depth and to which I made a contribution, was not under my editorial control. I'm comfortable with my earlier comment.

[Mike Bull]

The analysis in the book in indeed our work, and we are very comfortable with it. The program, which did not cover the analysis in any significant depth and to which I made a contribution, was not under my editorial control. I'm comfortable with my earlier comment.

'Historian Neil Sheppard has completed a frame by frame analysis of the crash and made a new discovery- Bluebird had almost flipped on it's first run- and Campbell knew it'. The words of producer/narrator Mark Longhurst. So, fair enough, his choice of editorial content there, not yours. But then you yourself continue-

'...the boat is literally starting to fly. He would have known that the front end had got very light...' '...and he would have known because...'

-so editorial control or not, you are on record Neil as claiming, definitively, twice, that Donald KNEW about this 0.7 second incident. There is NO evidence of this. It's a supposition. All that had to be said was 'Look, we've found this 0.7 second incident here, though we don't know if Donald noticed it in the course of the normal battering he got from K7's normal hop, skip and jump passage over the water, but he MIGHT have done, and it MIGHT have then coloured his further actions'.

[sheppane]

I'm still very comfortable ...

[Renegadenemo]

The fact remains that the snapped forward engine mount is an equally likely culprit - a single failure that can satisfactorily explain every subsequent happening - but it's always been left as a research topic rather than made into sensationalist telly...

[f1steveuk]

I suspect that's because any research that has been done on the forward engine "brace" (it wasn't a mount as such) has shown that it proably snapped when K7 was in the throws of it's somersault, as it had been designed and stressed to hold in one direction only, the feeling being that it was unlikely to try and emulate a Gnat looping the loop?

I often wondered why CN7 had a telemetry system, and K7 didn't, that would answer a few questions, but as for K7 in flight, I have no doubt DC knew when that occured, he was after all a trained pilot as well as his previous experiences with a wayward K7.