What happens after the ejection from the fighter plane? How do they get eject?

When a pilot pulls his ejection seat’s handle, which is located either between his legs or on one or both sides, depending on the cockpit arrangement, an electrical pulse signals thrusters to unlock the hatch, then rotate it up and out into the air stream. In the case of the B-1, the explosion ripped open four hatches, one for each crew member.

Ejection is initiated by pulling a seat firing handle situated on the front of the seat bucket between the occupant's thighs. The parachute container is fitted with canopy breakers to enable the seat to eject through the canopy should the jettison system fail. After ejection, drogue deployment, man/seat separation, and parachute deployment are automatically controlled by an onboard multimode electronic sequencer. A barostatic harness release unit caters for partial or total failure of the electronic sequencer, and an emergency restraint release (manual override) system provides a further backup in the event of failure of the barostatic release.

The seat is ejected by action of the gas pressure developed within a telescopic catapult when the cartridges are ignited. An underseat rocket motor situated under the seat bucket is fired as the catapult reaches the end of its stroke, and sustains the thrust of the catapult to carry the seat to a height sufficient to enable the parachute to deploy even though ejection is initiated at zero speed, zero altitude in a substantially level attitude. The seat is stabilized and the forward speed retarded by a drogue and bridle system, followed by automatic deployment of the personnel parachute and separation of the occupant from the seat. Timing of all events after rocket motor initiation is controlled by the electronic sequencer, which uses altitude and airspeed information to select the correct mode of operation.

Two pilot tubes (one for backup) on the side of the seat measure aerodynamic pressure to assess the speed of the airplane. A port behind the seat back measures ambient air pressure to determine the altitude. A central processing system—either digital or analog—takes this data and makes a calculation to determine which of three possible modes to activate. (Navy fighter jet seats, like the Martin-Baker NACES, can have up to five options.)

Airplanes flying at low altitudes and low speeds will use a different sequence from that of jets flying at high speeds and high altitudes. For example, F-22s, which use the ACES II seat, will sometimes cruise at 50,000 feet, where there’s not much oxygen. The seat supplies supplemental oxygen, but because the pilot needs to get down to thicker air as rapidly as possible, the main chute doesn’t open right away. Instead, a smaller chute called a drogue deploys to stabilize the seat so it doesn’t tumble and to slow the pilot’s horizontal velocity. In a near free-fall, he plummets until he hits an altitude of 15,000 feet, at which point his main parachute automatically deploys.

At low altitudes a pilot doesn’t need to free-fall, so the main parachute opens immediately and the drogue stays in its case. All of the decisions based on speed, altitude, and the weight of the passenger are already made for the pilot before he even clears the aircraft.

Manufacturers have spent decades perfecting all the steps necessary for a fully automated ejection. A hole blows open overhead. The wind surges in. The pilot can feel the chemical cartridge ignite under his seat, which activates a catapult that pushes his seat up a rail. One-tenth of a second after yanking the handle, he’s out of there. As he clears the airplane a rocket system called STAPAC kicks in. The wind wants to flip the seat around like a milkweed seed, but the thrust from STAPAC offsets the rotation and keeps the seat and pilot upright and forward facing.

About two seconds after the seat is rocketed upward, the parachute opens, and that triggers a bell crank that pulls the pins on the seat belts so the seat falls clear of the pilot. After all the bang and rush, the airman drifts quietly for three or four seconds. Then a survival kit drops on a 25-foot line. Upon contact with the water, the kits’ raft and life vest automatically inflate.

While the success rate for ejections has improved dramatically since the 1940s, from about 50 percent to approximately 90 percent today, flailing limbs can get torn off by 600 mph winds, and ejection delays often shorten descents, and that increases the riskiness of the parachute landings. Women pilots, who weigh on average 50 pounds less than their male counterparts, are especially at risk because the lighter the object, the faster the toss and the greater the oscillation.

But even in the most extreme conditions, if a pilot doesn’t wait too long, the ACES II can usually pull off a save. When Captain Jon Counsell had to eject from an F-15C on a training run over the Gulf of Mexico in 1995, he was going Mach 1.4, beyond the accepted parameters for success on the ACES II, which draws the line at 600 knots (690 mph). His limbs flailed so violently during the ejection that he broke his left arm, fractured his left leg in five places and dislocated both knees. Doctors thought he’d never walk again, but seven years later he’s back in the cockpit. In an exchange with the Navy, he now flies F/A-18s.

The emergency escape system incorporates several explosive cartridges and rockets containing propellant charges. Inadvertent firing of any of these may result in serious or fatal injury to personnel on, or in the vicinity of, the aircraft.

Ejection control handle safety pins and safe/armed handles are provided to render the ejection seats safe when the aircraft is parked between flights and at all other times on the ground. The ejection control handle safety pins are removed by the aircrew before flight and installed by the plane captain after flight. Movement of the safe/armed handle is the responsibility of the aircrew.

Before entering the cockpit, personnel should ensure that the correct safety precautions have been applied.

The F/A-18 aircraft is equipped with a type SJU-17(V)1/A ejection seat. The F/A-18D

aircraft is equipped with a type SJU-17(V)2/A and a type SJU-17(V)1 /A ejection seat installed in the forward and aft cockpits, respectively. The seats are interconnected by a command sequencing system. The two types of seat are essentially the same, but with differences to suit the two cockpit installations. For convenience, the description that follows applies equally to both ejection seats, except where noted. Where reference is made to the aft seat configuration on the F/A-18D, the description applies equally to the single seat (F/A-18C) installation.

All NACES seats incorporate fully automatic electronic sequencing and are cartridge operated and rocket assisted. Safe escape is provided for most combinations of aircraft altitude, speed, attitude, and flight path within the envelope of

zero speed, zero altitude in a substantially level attitude to a maximum speed of 600 knots estimated air speed (KEAS) between zero altitude and 50,000 feet.

F15 Ejection at Supersonic speed: