Pilot Dies After Planes Collide In Mid-Air

Mid-air is sooooo rare and doesn't usually have a pleasant outcome. I knew the victim of this accident, a kind, friendly, professional pilot that has been a familiar face around the field for many years. Bless you mate, and your family at this tragic time.

I also used to live close to the airport and used it on numerous occasions. Very sad this has happened. Condolences to family and friends of the pilot. RIP.

This guy probably saved many lives by avoiding the houses, it just shows his bravery and calm thinking in the moments before the crash. He had accepted that he was going to die and nobody else was going to. What a brave man, RIP.

I live less than a mile from the scene...its so, so sad. It really brings it home to you when its so close. You often hear things like this on the news when it happens in far away places and dismiss it but when its on your own doorstep its very different. My heart and thoughts go out to the family. God bless the person who died. R.I.P.

What a wonderful man to think of others at a time like that.. God bless him and his family left behind.. such a terrible shame ..

How very sad. There are so many aircraft using this little airport and this is a tragedy. My family live close by and I often take my grandchildren to the very nearby play area. Thank heavens there were no more casualties.
Thoughts are with the dead person's family.

My thoughts are going out to this gentleman, this family and to those also involved in this tragedy. Please ignore the pontificating trolls on this thread who show about as much humanity and compassion as a dead slug. They're not important but the acknowledgement of this tragedy is and the fact the pilot did his best to avoid making the situation worse.

BULLSHIT - It was a tragic accident for sure and quite probably NOT the fault of the poor chap (RIP) that died but if the tail section of the plane came off ("was seen floating down") there is now way the pilot had any control whatsoever over the falling wreckage. It was LUCK that there was no collision with buildings, not heroism. (Note - I am a flying instructor and pilot.)

I would like to send my condolences to the family of the deceased pilot and also thinking of the surviving pilots who will be in shock.
But I do have a problem with the claim of heroism for the deceased pilot, I'm not saying that he wasn't a hero as I was not there, but the evidence as presented in the article doesn't point to it.
Rob Piatt an eyewitness claims - "He did very well to get it to the recreation ground and not crash in the airfield itself." The Airfield would have been the ideal place to set it down controlled or otherwise, as there are no members of the public wandering around and there would be emergency vehicles on-hand.
The Recreation Ground according to Rob Piatt "On a gorgeous day like today there would have been loads of people out on the recreation ground."
So in my humble opinion (being an Aircraft Propulsion Engineer for a couple of decades and attending more crash sites than I care to remember) If he could control the Aircraft, which is unlikely if the Fin or Tailplane had come off as reported by eyewitnesses then he appears to have chosen a public space as apposed to the Airfield; or, which I think is more likely, the Aircraft has made an uncontrolled crash and the pilot was unable to control it.
But I am merely making my judgement on the article written above and the accounts of eyewitnesses, for all I know he could have battled valiantly at the controls and did avoid extra casualties, but that is not what the evidence presented suggests.

A brave man has been lost to the country, rip

Hi, I am a pilot and have also been involved in a forced landing. I can assure you that the only reason for trying to land in a field is that you may survive, and that is what you are taught in your training. Who would try and make a forced landing onto a house. Journalists always say that he tried to save others lives. Believe me the only life you are thinking about in those few moments is your own, and a field is the best option. My condolances to the pilots family, a tragic accident.

Highest respect for the pilot for avoiding the houses, putting others lives before his own.

I am sorry but I did not add my sad feelings for the pilot who died and may have done his best to avoid coming down on top of others. One does not have a lot of time to think at 1000ft and if flying sufaces had been ripped off then there were no options when free falling disorientated at an increasing rate of 32 ft per second per second in perhaps 30 seconds.

With all the air traffic in the world it is amazing this sort of thing is so rare
Thank god (or air traffic controle) that it is.
Very sad all the same

I have a little story to tell,

In September of 1974 I had commenced my first solo cicuit out of Shoreham in a Condor and having completed my downwind checks I turned on to base leg to descend from 1000ft to 500ft, throttled back and applied flaps and my engine cut!

My first thought was that my instructor had done something to catch me out.

I can tell you now that my brain went into hyper suvival mode and I immediately considered trying to land on Truly Hill or the busy A27 and remembered not to pull the starter while the prop was wndmilling and then rapidly carried out my downwind checks again to find that in my nervousness I had selected weak mixture instead of carburetor heat as the knobs were above one another. The engine immediately picked up and I climbed up and did a long final to land safely.

I don't think to this day that I had ever considered so many options at once in such a short time span and within about 300ft of descent and I possibly owe my life to learning my checks off by heart.

I remember that even then Shoreham could be a very busy light aviation airport in the circuit and there were always very near misses. It is quite built up around there and one does not have a lot of options unless they are north over the downs or even over the sea.

At the time this had happened my club had not even taught me how to do forced landings.

Folk posting here may be right that he didn't really have time to be actively trying to avoid people. But nonetheless he didn't hit anyone on the ground and no one else died. No one knows for certain what it was like from his perspective, and sadly he died himself. Spinning it into a great act of heroism might be a little much but I see no harm in attributing good intentions to his final moments to give his family some measure of comfort in their grief.

How very sad, my thoughts go out to this brave man, and to his family to.

I doubt very much if the pilot deliberately steered his aircraft to avoid habitiation. Depending on the damage to the aeroplane, it is unlikely he would have had sufficient control to do this. It's a nice thought though. Without the results of an investigation, no one, least of all the police, sjhould come to such a premature conclusion. I speak as a former pilot

Reply for Mike , all aircraft have strict regulation as do pilots ! there are thousands of crashes on the road every year and very few in the air.
Your comments show just how uneducated you clearly are !

I dont think this was an act of "bravery" more so an act of terror trying to land on flat ground in fits of panic, this aint the movies, This is real life and real people, he was acting on instinct and was trying to survive, It is a massive tradegy, I feel for his family and friends. RIP