Grumman Avenger ditching at Cocoa Beach

[Priller]

Sad news!

https://theaviationist.com/2021/04/1...beach-airshow/

Priller

[Motormouse]

Sad news!

https://theaviationist.com/2021/04/1...beach-airshow/

Priller

Reasonably soft-ish landing, repairable I would expect if they are careful fishing it out of the oggin; unlike wot happened to that pby couple of years back.

Ttfn

Pete

[stansdds]

No one killed and the pilot made a very good water landing.

[stansdds]

A crane has been used to drag the Avenger onto the beach. It looks like it can be restored, but I'm sure it will take quite a bit of time.

[stansdds]

[Josh Patterson]

A crane has been used to drag the Avenger onto the beach. It looks like it can be restored, but I'm sure it will take quite a bit of time.

At first I was wondering why they didn't use the tailhook to pull the plane out instead of wrapping the straps around the tail, then I remembered how the Grumman tailhooks of this era operated. It's pretty much flush with the rear of the plane with no power to extend it.

[Mike71]

----. It's pretty much flush with the rear of the plane with no power to extend it.

Navy tail hooks are pretty much foolproof, designed to be available in the DOWN position anytime, by gravity. In the TBF, it was held up with a latch operated by a cable to the cockpit. A simple idea, been around for a LONG time. They probably did not want to fumble around in the semi - submerged cockpit trying to get to it.