On Wed, 27 Dec 2006 20:54:30 -0800, Jack Allison
wrote:

Yeah, it's hard to tell...and we may never know if it's real or a fake.
I've seen enough faked pictures that I tend to first suspect they're
fake. Movies though...this is the first one I've wondered about.
Interesting observations though Dudley.

It's not a fake. Yes it was close. Yes, the pilot of that Yak
realizes that fact, and I've heard nothing to indicate that he hasn't
learned something as a result of that flight (I have no doubt he
considers himself very lucky and has learned from the incident).

Makes me want to bring up a comment made by an (forgotten to me
by now, sorry) airshow performer who opined there is no reason to
put an irreplaceable WW-II (or other) warbird at risk by performing
maneuvers that have you "pulling for your life" in order to complete
the manuever.... From an average airshow-goer's perspective,
what's the difference between a low-level pull-up to a split-ess with
a resulting half-cuban dive to the deck (such that, if everything goes
as planned) you live and airplane flies again, from a similar vertical
maneuver that is transformed to a positive G lateral pitch-out
recovery that doesn't have you "pulling for your life" to complete the
manuever. An example of the latter would be a high-G pitch-out with a
roll in excess of 90 degrees which has you recovering at something
less than a 90 degree down-line normal to the plane of the earth....
I've seen more than one high-time airshow warbird performer limit his
act to such maneuvers, and the thought that occurs to me is if the
picture/sight out the windscreen isn't what is expected, he now has
the option of (slightly) leveling the wings and pulling out of the
manuever instead of "pulling for his life" and hoping there is enough
airspace betwixt him and terra firma to stay out of the news /
newspapers....

Bela P. Havasreti