European Stars And Stripes (Newspaper) - June 30, 1988, Darmstadt, Hesse The stars and stripes vol. 47. No. 74 authorized unofficial publication for the . Armed ponces thursday june 30,1988 of Hahn officials As 30-year-old Dpi. Michael a. Can dalt. The other Pilot. Cape. Robert Mccormack 31. Suffered a Sec Ond degree Burn on the right Side of his neck and a compression fracture of inc lower vertebrae. He was flown by Heli copter to the . Air Force regional medical Center at Wiesbaden. Crat Idall an air Force Academy Grad uate had Bill at Hahn since August i9s5. German state councilman Gerulf her Vot spokesman for the German authorities at the Accident site said tic planes were lying together Over inc Field about a mile from Bodenheim when the Lead plane made a right turn. The second plane failed to make the same turn and Dew into the Leader Herzo Suid. Air Force officials were not releasing details of the Accident. The collision occurred in overcast weather As the planes were returning from an air to air training Mission. There was Only training a Mimi see crashes on Back Page of finishes replacing engines in 31 f-16s Washington Butiu Washington the air Force has replaced the engines of 31 Flat jul fighters because of potential cracks in High Speed engine Blades problems that an Industry spol Nirann cited As a possible cause of an april 18 crash in an open Field near Ernberg. West Germany. The Likely cause of the april crash came to Light As the air Force completed replacing 31 general Bleckrie Al 10 engines in Europe Japan and Korea. In an interview last week general electric spokes Man Bill Schuman said the Enburg crash was caused by an engine problem and As far As i know that engine problem was believed to have been caused by one of these Blade the crash in which the Pilot from rams Cin a ejected safely followed the March 31 crash of an f-16 in the Village of Forse. West Germany that killed a Hahn a Pilot and a German Man in his Home. The april 18 crash triggered a request from German de sense minister Manfred Werner that f-l6s in West Germany be grounded but Safe commander Gen. William l. Kirk opted to keep the planes flying. Safe could not comment on the Blade crack re port wednesday the command was expected to give details on the engine problems thursday. The replacement program began after general elec tric and the air Force found cracks in several gel 10 engines. As a precaution 23 engines were removed in Europe and eight from planes in Japan and Korea. Schuman said the air Force removed All f110 engines having More than 550 flight ii ours. The planes were refitted with other engines while the Al 10 engine were returned to general electric for repair. If you Don t repair them eventually the crack grows and eventually you lose the engine Schuman said. It can cause an engine failure. And if the engine stops the f-16 being u single engine air plane. Yuu a got real most f-i6s Are powered by a i ran Whitney engine. The Al 10 was ordered by the air Force in 19s4 As part of an Effort to increase Competition among engine manufacturers. Schuman said several engine cracks have been found to Dale. The first was part of a general electric test of an engine with Over 9,000 cycles Well past the engine s estimated life Span of 8,000 cycles or about Ili Ghl hours. We were running tests to see How Long the engine would last Schuman said. And on routine inspection we found cracks in two Blades Schuman snid the air Force was alerted to the Dis covery and the service eventually found cracks in two f-16 engines. One of the engines had cracks on iwo of see engines on Back Page
