Sadly; and I note this from empirical observation derived from 30 years in the warbird and specialty aviation business, so many of these accidents arise from inexperienced pilots with too much money flying too much aeroplane for their experience level and yearly hour count
Sadly I'm affraid you're very mistaken, and it would be a tremendous shame if you or anyone else were to continue to get others to believe it too.
That certainly does sound like the trend that existed around 3, 4, or 5 decades ago, but that is not the basis of what has been contributing to so many of the incidents this year, and in recent years. Please don't begin to tell me that it was too much money, too much ego, and too much lack of experience that contributed to the death of Jimmy Leeward, and those in the crowd at Reno. And this incident today, with the T-28 Trojan Horsemen, there is next to nothing to go on yet as to why it even happened. They train and perform all year round, and I
guarantee you that there is no money nor ego that is driving them to do what they enjoy providing for the aviation community. It certainly takes money, and a lot of it, to own and operate these aircraft, let alone acquire the years of training that all of them do, and I don't accept the connection you make with having too much money, being a safety concern. Please mention an incident this year that you believe was contributed to by having too much money, too much lack of experience, or too much of an ego on the part of the pilot, and I'll be glad to discuss it.
The unfortunate truth of the matter, is that as in the case of the Reno incident yesterday, most all of these airshow incidents are purely caused by circumstances that you simply could never expect to happen nor have the time or presence of being to be able to correct, no matter who you are and how much experience you've built up.
Also, what you don't ever hear talked about too much, are the precautions that so many people within the warbird industry have taken to continue to ensure there has been as much safety in place as there has, with more warbirds flying today than ever before. For instance, the P-51 Horsemen team, went from a 3 ship to a 2 ship early in the year, due to the fact that one could not committ enough time to the shows and practices - this was decided on their own, both with their safety and the safety of the airshow audience in mind. The Liberty Belle emergency resulted in no injuries, and B-17 owners, the country over, performed inspections on their aircraft before flying them again, under no pressure to do so than their own. The same goes to the US Navy Blue Angels, who stood down after a safety issue was noticed and could then be rectified before continuing on.
