Big Beautiful Doll

This is the Big Beautiful Doll Mustang.

I took this a few years ago on a 6 mp camera, the Nikon D70. Today, the iPhone has 5mp! And Nokia has a phone that has 42mp. But don't get hung up on size, guys. Read Ken Rockwell's myth-busting explanation on megapixel size here.  

This lovely warbird was destroyed last year in an air collision with the pilot bailing out just before the plane hit the ground. No one was injured. Here is the video of his amazing escape.

I love aircraft and flying, and can't resist an airshow. My first airshow was at Farnborough back in 1968 when my father took me along. He borrowed a camera with a 300mm lens for me to take some shots, and during the show I witnessed my one and only fatal air crash. The six French crew were killed when their twin engined maritime plane, doing a low level turn with one engine shut down, a wing tip hit the roof of the airfields sheds. I was watching it through my camera and had no idea how close it was to the ground.

I remember being surprised at the silence. The huge ball of flame from the crash billowed into the sky without a sound. It's not like the movies... This is the shot I took a fraction of a second after the crash. I found it difficult to comprehend I'd just watched six people lose their lives.