Talk:Ramstein air show disaster

Missing Man Formation?

Under the "Accident Process" section, the text says "After the crash the remaining group had to circle the airbase in missing man formation." There's even a link to "Missing Man formation," but I think it highly unlikely that a ceremonial formation would be used under emergency circumstances like that. Can anyone document this? Septegram 18:34, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

OK, it's been over a month, and no response. I'm going to delete the reference.

Septegram 14:34, 10 October 2006 (UTC)

@Septegram

You are correct. I was there. The runway they took off from was trashed. Being in a military airspace with surrounding civilian airspace they didn't know where to go so they circled until given orders. That wasn't a "missing man" but it was very creepy watching them circle. Excellent choice in deleting that section.

Sorry this took so long to respond. I just became aware of this page... It's full of inaccurate facts. This is the first of my corrective suggestions :) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Lesds (talk • contribs) 04:44, 23 May 2015 (UTC)

Rammstein relevance

Regarding this edit: I can agree with the Trivia heading not being appropriate, but the fact that the band Rammstein was named after the event and that one of their first and major songs is a tribute to the event is relevant and definitely relating to the event. --rxnd ( t | € | c ) 07:44, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

Seconded. I'm going to replace it, under the heading "References in popular culture". Blood Red Sandman ^{(Talk) (Contribs)} 16:18, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

Here's one more comment, which I trust will serve as final proof of the relevance of this section: at the article 1991 Hamlet chicken processing plant fire, which was recently promoted to FA status, there is a similar section - not one of the FA reviewers thought this was a problem (although one did wonder if it's format should maybe be converted). Convinced now? Blood Red Sandman ^{(Talk) (Contribs)} 15:54, 30 March 2007 (UTC)

GA review comments

Well, here you go:

• All fair use images are missing fair use rationale for inclusion in this article - this should be remedied immediately.
• Why is "(Ramstein, county of Kaiserslautern, Germany)." added at the end of the lead in parentheses? It's out of context.
• "Aermacchi MB-339PAN" - is PAN part of the aircraft designation? It's used here and nowhere else.
• Ref [1] need only be used once in the Crash section, right at the end.
• "...and went to ..." - landed at?
• Emergency response section lacks citation, and should be written in prose rather than listified.
• "(80 km)" - firstly use a non-breaking space between the 80 and the km, secondly, is this mentioned because of the sizeable distance? If so, bring that to the attention of the reader.
• Do something about the [citation needed] tag.
• "Better coordination and organization of the rescue efforts would probably have prevented some of the deaths. " - this sounds like original research to me.
• Citation needed for "The German authorities vowed to avoid such failures in the future and conduct regular large-scale drills using simulated disasters that involve all emergency services."
• Expand PTSD.
• Aftermath and references section need citations.
• Why translate 400 meters into feet and not translate any of the other units in the article? Also, make sure to use non-breaking spaces as mentioned above.
• Again, use prose instead of listing out the new safety regulations, I think it's relatively easy to make that section read a lot better.
• External links need serious trimming per WP:EL - probably only need two, and definitely not the blogs.

So, primarily because of the issues with fair use images, problems with prose and lack of citations, I'm going to fail the GA at this time. If the above issues are dealt with, please feel free to re-nominate the article for GA. If you'd like any help with implementing the above then let me know. The Rambling Man 07:27, 31 July 2007 (UTC)

deletions

John, removing the documentary of relatives of victims is not an option. Read them first or keep away. Guidod 18:22, 15 October 2007 (UTC)

External links

External links on Wikipedia are supposed to be "encyclopedic in nature" and useful to a worldwide audience. Please read the external links policy before adding more external links.

The following kinds of links are inappropriate:

• Online discussion groups or chat forums
• Personal webpages and blogs
• Multiple links to the same website
• Websites that are selling things (e.g., books or memberships)

Links which do not comply with the policy must not be included in the article. WhatamIdoing (talk) 05:20, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Original Research, esp in "Analysis" section?

On April 10, 2008, editor Cynjut (Talk | contribs) made a number of changes, which added a new section, "Analysis". None of that section cites reliable sources. It speaks about research in the passive voice. The section ends by saying, "...If the accident had occurred 50 feet east of where it did, it would have ... probably killed me." If "me" refers to the editor, then I understand why they would have expertise and passion about this topic. It makes me wonder if the entire Analysis section is original research, which is against Wikipedia policy. I think this section needs at least a change to remove the "me" reference, and some citation of reliable sources which do the analysis. I'm leaving the editor a message on their Talk page. --Jdlh | Talk 19:41, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

67 dead, or 31 dead?

"Sixty-seven spectators and three pilots died and 346 spectators sustained serious injuries in the resulting explosion and fire."

"Of the 31 people who died at the scene, 28 had been hit by shrapnel in the form of airplane parts, concertina wire, and debris from items on the ground.[2] Sixteen of the fatalities occurred in the days and weeks after" —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.91.23.122 (talk) 04:58, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

Seems ok to me. 31 audience dead at the scene and 16 died days and weeks after, which leaves 20 audience to have died in transport or during the first day of treatment. How do you get the 67 figure? --rxnd (talk) 03:25, 22 July 2008 (UTC)

1. There were numerous wagons parked at the impact area, kiosks vending foods and there were many hundreds there and in the trajectory path. So, I'm not buying these numbers. They were considerably higher.

2. I saw charred bodies dead and burned beyond recognition or viability of survival strewn in a 180 degrees spread reaching all the way back to the control tower. Also in direct line of trajectory impact.

3. There were two waves of shrapnel. Horizontal and the 2nd wave shrapnel that first went up 360 and then followed gravity down and straight into the entire 180 occupied area

4. Drivers of the 53rd transportation truck battalion hauled remains in refrigeration units. Also not mentioned. Drivers of companies 66, 86 and 501 were tasked from kleber kaserne on the east side of kaiserslautern.

5. An entire battalion of USARMY ambulances sat untasked in the forest of Coleman Barracks roughly 25 minutes from kaiserslautern.

6. Ambulances were sounding every night for over a week, which was very unusual for kaiserslautern.

7. I was due south of the impact less than 200meters away and watched a woman 10ft in front of me siting in a lawn chair hit dead in her chest and left with a good 6 foot hole center mass killing her instantly

8. Besides the woman was an approx 8 yo boy whose arm was torn off at the elbow and it flew past me.

9. I walked through from runway to the nearest end of the control tower building and no way any of those people survived, None, and I can assure you they numbered in the several 100ds, as did the bulk mass of audience that had gathered between runway(concertina wire) and concession wagons.

10. At minimum 2 drivers and trucks with refrigerator trailers per company made at least 2 trips hauling body bags. Even laid only one high the number would exceed this stories count, as well as the official narrative.

I later met with an investigative journalist of the German news magazine Das Stern, in Heidelberg, who also vehemently disagreed with the final count and put his figure at several hundred, which is what i saw when i crossed through the kill field. 2601:144:8100:4E20:10C5:AFC2:ECF1:DB6A (talk) 20:11, 10 August 2023 (UTC)

Correction: left with a 6 inch hole(completely through her torso(chest/heart)) 71.200.103.250 (talk) 20:16, 10 August 2023 (UTC)

Now it says "Sixty-seven spectators and four pilots died" but the total in the infobox is still 70. Which is right? --129.21.93.164 (talk) 13:38, 21 September 2009 (UTC)

Timeline

Personally, I feel as if the timeline presented on the article would better be suited for a table. Hence, here is my crack at it:

Time	Details
3:40	Start of the Frecce Tricolori
3:44	Collision
3:46	Fire fighters arrive
3:48	First American ambulance arrives
3:51	First American ambulance helicopter arrives
3:52	Second American ambulance helicopter arrives
3:54	First American ambulance helicopter takes off
4:10	German ambulance helicopter Christoph 5 from Ludwigshafen arrives
4:11	German ambulance helicopter Christoph 16 from Saarbruecken arrives
4:13	10 American and German ambulances arrive
4:28	About 10 - 15 ambulances arrive. 8 medical helicopters (US Air Force, ADAC, SAR) at the scene
4:33	First medical helicopter of the Rettungsflugwacht arrives
4:35	Doctor on emergency call over the radio: "We are searching for burnt patients that are pulled and transported unaided away from us by the Americans. They told us nobody from them are here no more. Not all the injured people are transported away by helicopter or ambulance. There is total chaos around us and some of the injured are even transported on Pick Up trucks that are not leaving on emergency exit, they are driving beside the drifting visitors. It was a terrible sight to see people with burnt clothes and sagging burnt skin, squirming with pain of transfixed and shocked with pain on these vehicles.
4:40	First low platform trailer for transport of the dead bodies arrives
4:45	Second low platform trailer for transport of the dead bodies arrives
4:47	At that time the German headquarter for emergencies had no clue of the dimensions, obvious by the radio communication: "Yes, and that is the problem. We don't know yet what had happened, how many injuries and what else. The leading emergency medical did not send any feedback yet. He wants to have a synoptic view first"
5:00	At that time several medics arrive with helicopters. Later they said: "At the time we arrived shortly after 5:00 there where no injured people no more. We could see that the last badly injured people where loaded into American helicopters. We could see some Pick Up trucks with injured people transporting them away. It was not possible to find a officer in charge, a director of operations or even a contact person [...] so we got to the Johannis hospital in Landstuhl by own initiative. Asking several action forces, paramedics, police officers nobody could name a director of operations. I was asking for a managing paramedic of the operation to coordinate the evacuation. But there was none."
6:05	A ambulance helicopter arrives at the Landstuhl Regional Medical Center. The paramedic said later: "We found a large number of severely burnt, badly injured people absolutely unaided. [...] When I arrived in Landstuhl, severely burnt people partly lay on wooden planks and no paramedics where there. After I aided a injured person and left her with a hospital nurse that attended us at the flight, I was treating several injured people at the helicopter landing zone at the military hospital and did not see even one American medic there"
6:20	Dead bodies are transported away from the scene with the two platform trucks
6:30	A bus full of injured people arrives in Ludwigshafen (80 km away). A paramedic later said: "5 severely burnt people where inside the bus. There was no paramedic attending this transport. Just a not German speaking driver unfamiliar with the area, on an odyssey through the town until he was able to find the hospital."

If you support this format of display the timeline, please say so here. If you oppose, please voice your opinion and reason as well. I do believe that minor things like the header-text should be tweaked, but other than that, I think it looks much better than the fragmented way it is shown right now. Aly89 (talk) 05:11, 10 November 2008 (UTC)

 Done. Please feel free to critique my modifications. Aly89 (talk) 19:51, 12 November 2008 (UTC)

Well, seems someone made their own edit and added "1994 - The greatest band ever, Rammstein, started." Although I do agree it's a good band, I took it off anyway. --96.30.148.240 (talk) 02:35, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

Changes to Air Shows

I was in the RAF at the time this disaster happened and I remember some 'best practise' or possibly legislation that came in as a result of this incident. I think the primary change was that manoeuvres were no longer permitted to run towards the crown line. Instead, they had to be carried out parallel to the crowd at a minimum distance.

I wonder whether anyone can confirm any changes that came out as part of this incident? Can reference it? Comment whether it should be included in the article. G0ggy (talk) 14:37, 24 June 2009 (UTC)

The german article has all those changes listed and referenced.

Here is a rough translation:

From august 29th on airshows were completely forbidden. 3 Years later the ban was lifted, but severe restrictions were intoduced:

• A minimum flight altitude and a minimum clearance to the audience.
• No maneuvers above or towards the audience allowed.
• All maneuvers must be approved before the show begins.
• During flights in formation only loopings, flybys and rollers are allowed to be shown, and no aircraft is to leave its place in the formation. Complex formation anullments and risky encounter maneuvers are forbidden.

The first time a military acrobatics flight squadron with jet fighters flew again in Germany was in the year 2000, during the "Internationale Luft- und Raumfahrtausstellung" (ILA) (In English: International Aerospace Exhibition) in Berlin. The "Patrouille de France".

• Military acrobatics flight squadrons with jet fighters were only allowed on the ILA Berlin, and unter strict sanctions, until 2009.

— Preceding unsigned comment added by 91.33.188.11 (talk • contribs)

assessment

This needs some work, in addition to reliable sources.

1. what is the Ramstein air show should be the first section.
2. types of exhibits that were planned for this day
3. pierced heart incident (what you have is good, great description)
4. Bi-furcated Emergency response

How did the poor emergency response influence the death rate -- didn't most of the victims die afterward? not immediately (except the pilot who hit the runway without a shute...)

1. Aftermath --

media feeding frenzy immediately aftward

investigation, emergency response protocols revised

1. cultural references, etc.

Auntieruth55 (talk) 20:57, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

I added reference to a study on the psychological evaluations. As to the setting, it was a normal airshow - might be able to find which demo teams were there. I sold programs as a choir fundraises most of the day and finally stopped for a late lunch when the accident happened. (I had seem them practice the day before at what seemed barely treetop level.) The Germans came as much for American ice cream and sweet corn as for the airshow, except for the German youth model airplane club that was positioned where the lead plane went into the crowd - most local media frenzy was the loss of the schoolchildren. Somewhere I have a photo of the aircraft wreckage where it hit the corner of a 'V' between two refrigerator trucks and stopped its further progress into the crowd. And yes, most died from burns from hot jet fuel. --DeknMike (talk) 17:36, 28 July 2011 (UTC)

Missing Man formation

I was there on this sad day. I was standing approx. 50 meters left to the impact area of Ivo Nutarelli´s plane. As i was trying to understand what had happend around me,i looked up. I saw two formations (the freece tricolori had a ten planes with three just crashed): one formation of three with one plane trailing smoke and the others as escort heading for Spangdahlem airbase.

The other one of four flew in a missing man formation over the field. But i had the feeling then and now still i believe it was a personal fairwell and not ordered by ATC or some other power. They flew much to high to be regognized by the the stuned crowd. It was a private tribute to the victims of the accident. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 93.221.218.123 (talk) 19:08, 16 May 2011 (UTC)

Requested diagram of the aerobatic maneuver

Diagram, Version 1

I tried to create a diagram showing how the disaster happened including the aerobatic figure (I guess that was requested). The solist is marked red, the two formations are blue, the spectator area is orange, the impact points on the ground are numbered.

Obviously, the size of the aerobatic figure is not correct, I don't have any figures about the size of it, so that is only a very rough approximation.

I would be happy to get some criticism on how I can improve the diagram. --Julian Herzog (talk) 15:57, 19 June 2011 (UTC)

Hi Julian
Thanks for a very good try at explaining the disaster via a diagram which even I could follow! It should fit-in well with the description of the 'heart' maneuver near the article's beginning. Here are a couple of other comments that might improve things still more:
1. What does the grey arrow represent? It could possibly confuse readers, but if it is there to give 'depth', fair enough; nevertheless there should be some sort of explanation.
2. It could be good if your diagram showed where the largest pieces of debris came to rest and the fireballs occurred. (You would probably have to tread a fine line here, as the temptation to put too much detail in might be hard to resist).

Regards

RASAM (talk) 20:00, 4 October 2011 (UTC)

Julian. Brilliant diagram, however as you mentioned the scale is wrong, in this way the size of the ground diagram needs to be reduced to about 60%, i.e. the loops are larger. There is a video where you can see the curves the planes took, relative to the ground. 67.180.156.92 (talk) 13:54, 5 February 2014 (UTC)--

Don't like the truth ?

The WikiPedia Senior Expert RichardW removed this line about I-TIGI case "....unrelated with their daily duties, moreover their TF-104 was the only Italian A.F. aircraft in flight at the time of the accident and they were the only crew which sent a "maximal alert" codified signal..'''' " I don't know if RichardW is a CIA man or a right wing WASP, he just can clean my contribution on Wikipedia pages but he cannot hide the truth. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Kiko 64 (talk • contribs) 19:33, 23 December 2013 (UTC)

Your edit resulted in the following sentence:

Judge Rosario Priore, who was investigating the case at the time, found that they were performing training flights nearby minutes before the Ustica incident, but somewhat unrelated with their daily duties, moreover their TF-104 was the only Italian A.F. aircraft in flight at the time of the accident and they were the only crew which sent a "maximal alert" codified signal,nevertheless he definitely rejected their deaths as sabotage.

That sentence is, in my opinion, too complex. Its meaning is unclear, and I'm not sure how relevant your addition is.

Richard 13:13, 6 January 2014 (UTC)

PS: it is not necessary to post the same question twice. I have removed one instance. Furthermore I don't like your insinuation that I'm a 'right wing WASP'. I'm not CIA either. Your 'he cannot hide the truth' suggests a conspiracy of some sort.

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What?

 " In January 1991, Werner Reith, a German journalist from the newspaper Die Tageszeitung, suggested in an article that the Ramstein disaster could have been caused by some sudden technical problem—or even sabotage—in Nutarelli's plane. No supporting evidence could be collected. Reith pointed out that Lt. Col. Nutarelli and Lt. Col. Naldini were supposed to know details about another air disaster, the 1980 Ustica massacre, citing Italian press sources. Judge Rosario Priore, who was investigating the case at the time, found that they were performing training flights nearby minutes before the Ustica incident, but he definitely rejected their deaths as sabotage. "

Am I the one one who finds this paragraph baffling? What does the pilot's potential knowledge about another air disaster have to do with whether the jet was sabotaged? What do training flights at a nearby base have to do with sabotage? This appears to be a collection of unrelated statements collected here for no particular reason, and without any obvious relevance to the rest of the article. Also, the way the text reads you'd think the main point of this article is to bash the emergency response. No doubt there are many important and relevant issues that were raised, things that could have been done better, but it seems like the general theme of every section is "they totally screwed it up, see??" Is this the official position of the German emergency authorities? Is there universal consensus that the response was basically a comedy of errors, or is this just someone with a chip on the shoulder?

64.223.162.221 (talk) 19:46, 23 November 2020 (UTC)

Attendance

The first sentence states there were 300,000 people at the air show that day. Really?! Can this figure be verified? 30,000 sound more probable to me. 91.85.42.17 (talk) 19:22, 16 October 2022 (UTC)

The number of 300,000 is correct, it's in the official investigation report made by the German goverment. 188.100.221.183 (talk) 10:14, 26 October 2022 (UTC)