Talk:Hawker Siddeley Trident

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I added the following text. I found mention of a "trident aircraft" crash on the 1979 page. After some searching, I found some information on google that was 'not' simply a direct quote of the wikipedia entry, which I sourced.

On March 14, 1979, a Trident 2E crashed into a factory near Beijing, killing at least 200. According to another source, this crash was caused by an unqualified pilot who stole and flew the plane. That source mentions total fatalities of all 12 crew, 32 ground, and no passengers. (see discussion)

The wikipedia entry says over 200 were killed, but this source [1] implies that only 44 were killed. Hopefully somebody can corroborate the information.

RealGrouchy 18:49, 7 Feb 2004 (UTC)
Hmmm, sort of interesting - but does it really belong in the article? Most aircraft pages don't mention all the crashes that a particular type has (in that case some pages would be full of lists of crashes) - the only reason that the Staines crash is mentioned here is that a) it's got a page of its own and b) it's notable for being the worst in the UK at that point in time. Graham 22:45, 7 Feb 2004 (UTC)

In addition, wasn't the aircraft Lin Biao flew on his escape which crashed in Mongolia a Trident as well? --JNZ 12:21, 13 May 2006 (UTC)

Contents

[edit] 727 commentary

I removed this speculative and somewhat NPOV text: Of course, the 727 was able to re-use the fuselage section of the 707 and thereby reduce development costs, and even if the Trident had been "perfect" it is unlikely that it would have had much success in the massive and very nationalistic US airline industry. -choster 22:21, 4 May 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Change of article name

Apologies didnt do a very good job (now sorted thanks to admin) - all non-user page links now point to Hawker Siddeley Trident in accordance with Wikipedia:Naming conventions (aircraft). MilborneOne 08:32, 15 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Boeing and the 727...

There is no mention in the development section about how the 727 almost exactly matches the HS.121 Trident's original specifications, of which a "US delegation including people from Boeing was given full access to the plans", David Maltby[2]. There is a brief reference later on in the article but it doesn't mention Boeing's involvement in the early life of the Trident.

Maybe someone would like to read up and write up on this? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 150.237.47.51 (talk) 03:50, 7 February 2008 (UTC)

All you have is anecdotal evidence from a non-published source. If there is a reliable, published source with proof of the relationship, then we can include it, but without such sources, it's just unprovable speculation. Btw, the Tupolev Tu-154 is very similar to both design. Can we tell whether the Soviets stole the design from the British or the Americans? Or in the Soviet's case is it pure coincidence, as the Soviets never copied other designs, despite their similarities? You know, maybe the British stole it from the Russians first, then the Americans copied it. - BillCJ (talk) 04:58, 7 February 2008 (UTC)
I think this is just speculation based on similarity, the aircraft would be based on the same specifications as these would be issued by the airlines. All three design teams had similar constraints the main one being engine power, you need three engines to meet the payload and range requirements where do you put them - not that many choices. Which is why the Trident and 727 have a similar configuration. By the time the Boeing 737 came around it was possible to get away with less engines and with the then deep stall problems with t-tails known the engines ended up under the wings. MilborneOne (talk) 12:48, 7 February 2008 (UTC)
Are you dissing the wisdom of David Maltby? :-p I understand that source is not reason enough to include such information/speculation, call it what you will; that is why the phrase "read up" is mentioned in my original post. I am not trying to say that the 727 is a copy of the HS.121... it can't be because the original specification for the HS.121 was never built (which is probably why it didn't really sell). As for the mention of the Tu-154, sharing a layout is not the same as sharing a specification; the 154 is significantly different from any other jet out there.... we'll leave industrial espionage in the realm of the Tu-144 and Il-62... Boeing were more than welcome to have the original HS.121 specs, because HS weren't gonna build it. 150.237.47.51 (talk) 06:07, 11 February 2008 (UTC)
Yes. :) Sarcasm aside, all David Maltby is making there is an observation, and with it a veiled accusation, that Boeing used - or even needed to use - the original HS.121 specs. As Milb1 said, both were trying to meet the needs of the airlines, and there was only so many ways one could go in meeting them. The engines available were limited, as was thrust, which dictated 3 rather than 2 engines. Sizing the wings to fit the airframe and performance needs would result in similar dimensions. I don't know if fuselage diameter and cabin size were the same between the HS.121 and 727, but it's well-known that Boeing based the cabin size on the 707, which certainly pre-dates HS.121. But again, if we're going to imply that Boeing actually used the data on the HS.121 in designing the 727, we need something much more credible than circumstantial evidence. That type of conclusion is fine on a one-owner internet site, but we have to have reliable, verifiable sources here. We'd need one to state that "Boeing were more than welcome to have the original HS.121 specs, because HS weren't gonna build it", because we don't actually know that to be true - company designs are usually copyrighted or otherwise legally-protected in some way, and Boeing would have probably needed explicit permission to use the plans in any way. - BillCJ (talk) 06:58, 11 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Another fact about the 1979 accident

In this article "What happened on 3/14/1979", a witness, who lived near the Beijing west-suburban airbase, says that in the 1979 accident, the plane exploded on the sky, but not crashed on the ground before the explosion. If this is true, maybe the jet plane stolen was shot down by missiles. It is reasonable because a fueled empty plane with only one pilot, who stole the plane, threatened the city of Beijing.


"3 月14日，记不清午后还是清晨，但我永远记得住那一幕，或者说那一幕记住了它唯一的证人。一架飞机在半空中突然变成了一个大火球，无声无息的大火球，很美很耀眼。几秒钟后，只是几秒钟，坠下一缕清烟，淡淡的一缕，火球象幽灵一样消逝了，天空蓝得吓人，干净得吓人。几秒钟，又是几秒钟，一朵大大的蘑菇云从地平线升起，白白的，同长崎和广岛的模样，蘑菇云如播放慢动作一般，从翻滚到消散，我静静地看着，如同看二十年代的无声电影，又过了不知多久，一阵嘈杂打破了我的凝思，父亲单位里跑出一群人，提着铁锹和水桶。"

"March 14th, I don't remember it was whether morning or afternoon, but I can never forget the consequent scene forever, in other words, the scene remembers me as its only witness. A plane became a big fireball , a big and silent fireball. It was beautiful and dazzling. Seconds after, just seconds, there was smoke falling down, very light, and the fireball disappeared like a ghost. The sky was so blue terribly. Yet after seconds , a mushroom cloud arose from the horizon. It was pure white, just like the ones arose in Nagasaki and Hiroshima. The mushroom cloud was rolling and vanishing in a slow motion. I watched it quietly as watching a 1920's silent movie. Time past unconsciously until a noise jumped into my ears. It was people running out my father's unit, with barrels and spades." —Preceding unsigned comment added by 119.11.66.250 (talk) 12:45, 5 March 2008 (UTC)

Accidents and incidents are only summarised in this article, if you have factual and verifiable sources then you should consider creating an article for the particular accident that can be linked from here. MilborneOne (talk) 22:37, 5 March 2008 (UTC)