They are saying Harrison Ford will recover. Great news. 
So, can I ask about the plane? Do you think it can be restored? There’s not that many WWII era planes still flying. It would be a shame to lose another one. I suspect Ford is thinking the same thing. It was probably an important part of his aircraft collection.
Since it is designed as a trainer then I guess its more easily repaired? Students would bang them up.
hi res photo
Gorgeous plane.
Certainly. The fuselage is not severely damaged, and the wings can be rebuilt or replaced.
The nose and engine seems like it took the worst damage. Hopefully they can get or make replacement parts.
I agree. Aircraft have been restored from worse damage than that. It looks like both the wings and engine itself can be rebuilt. The limiting factor is usually money but that is much less of an issue with a historic plane owned by a movie star. I am sure Ford loves that plane and will have it restored back to pristine condition just as a matter of pride.
Possible to restore? Sure. Economical? Not a chance, but then vintage or antique airplanes are not an economical hobby to begin with. The sad thing is she looks like she was very recently restored.
The parts all seem to still be there, and other than the engine, they’re probably all just sheet metal and paint - nothing exotic like carbon fiber laminates or whatever. Just lots and lots of body work.
The engine is the bigger question mark. The plane went down because the engine stopped working. Even if the engine stopped for some external reason like a plugged fuel filter, out of gas, etc., it will still need to be town down to the smallest bits for inspection. If the prop was turning as it hit the ground, a lot of parts will be expected to have been twisted or even shorn off.
If he makes a few phone calls from his hospital bed, the plane might be in the air again before he is!
I’ve always understood that as long as you have the aircraft data plate and the log book you can rebuild the airplane.
The ultimate Ship of Theseus.
I think the actual FAA reg is 45.13, but this UK summary is easier to read and I think it generally conforms to FAA practice.
Perhaps it can be repaired, but it will NEVER make the Kessel Run in 12 Parsecs.
Someone posted a link a while ago about an airliner that crashed on landing in Asia or someplace. The pictures made it look like a total loss. I’m not sure, but it may have been transported back to Seattle or another far-off repair facility. In any case, the aircraft was rebuilt and put back into service.
N53178 is a much simpler airplane with a whole lot less damage. People build airplanes of this size, sometimes designing them themselves, sometimes just using printed plans, using sheets of aluminum and tin snips. There are companies such as Aircraft Spruce & Specialty that sell everything you need to build an airframe. People who own or work with vintage airplanes know where to get parts and components. (I visited an ‘airplane junkyard’ once. It’s closed to the public now, but there were all kinds of planes to pull parts off of.) Kinner R-5/R-540 engines were built by the thousands, so there are parts and replacement engines available. Ford’s ST-3KR will undoubtedly fly again. It won’t be cheap, but I’d bet money it will be less expensive than buying a new Skyhawk.
What is everyone’s over/under on the cost for a full restoration of this plane just for fun? I thought about it a little while ago and came up with $300 - $450K based on nothing but my guesses based on reading about similar restoration projects over the years. The low end of that estimate is right in line with the cost of a new Cessna 172 Skyhawk so it may be close if my guess is in the ballpark.
It depends on how much is built from scratch and how much is sourced from spares. I’ve heard PT-22s usually sell for about $75,000, but I haven’t looked it up myself. (There are none currently for sale at controller or trade-a-plane, as far as I can see.)
The base price of a 2015 Cessna 172S is $364,000.
1941 PT-22 for sale in Belgium, €65,000
Barnstormers.com has a 1942 PT-22 listed at $67,500.
I hope so! What a gorgeous plane! And what a thrill it must have been to fly such a machine.
At least he’s probably got the money to have it fixed up properly. That’s got to be a really expensive hobby.
I guess it depends on what the strategy is then. If they did a restoration using parts from a flying or near-flying example, they would essentially be sacrificing one to save the other. I am not sure what the point of that would be.
The real cost is going to be in the labor involved and whether they want to restore the engine or just replace it with a refurbished one. Ford’s plane appears to be fairly pristine (or at least it was) so it is going to take a lot of skilled time and work to match that.
The one in Belgium looks nice but it is painted and that can hide a lot of small flaws. The crashed plane is highly polished aluminum which takes a lot of work to match just for that one superficial detail.
I wasn’t suggesting sacrificing another airplane. Just pointing out that it might not be that expensive (in airplane terms, of course) to repair N53178.
Paint can hide small flaws, but I doubt there’s anything serious. I mean, if you must get rid of the ding you can always replace the panel.
A guy had one in the early 60’s that he had restored. He & wife were on the way to Oshkosh and it threw an entire ½ of the propeller. It was opined that the engine did not even get a full rotation after that. There was a group going and several pilots behind him saw the blade part leave. They were not sure what it was until they saw the plane or talked to the guy flying.
The engine was hanging between the gear legs by the ‘P’ leads to the magnetos. Fuselage had a 25° bend right behind the rear seat.
Made Mr. Harrison’s look almost pristine. He rebuilt is again.
Today, those kind of people are hard to find and usually expensive.
I got to fly & land that one before it went down. Did not get to do the takeoff but, fly, it & land it were all mine. 
They are a wonderful trainer, no bad habits, landing gear could save a lot of really bad landings, and above all, they are very cool.
I bet this one is rebuilt. One of the things that makes me glad some rich people care about them. They have the $$$ to keep them in the air where they belong.
They are one of the most dangerous engines to hand start. The ones with the Kinner 145 radial engine. The blade tip goes a long way between compression points, it is way up their, they have impressive compression so you need to get up close and personal with them to make the swing.
Sure are pretty. 
Ford’s plane requires a hand start? Wow, I hadn’t considered that.
I’ve seen a start cart wheeled out to planes in old war movies. I guess its a bunch of batteries in a cart. They Wheel it out to the plane and connect a cable to start it. I always wondered what happens if the plane lands somewhere that doesn’t have one.
here’s one
Preferably by a burly German guy standing on a trapdoor.
I dunno. Seems like the kind of guy who would want to be involved. A hands-on sort.
(looking at his bio)
Hey! He was a counselor at my summer camp! A few years before, but still.
The start cart that you posted a picture of was used to start the A-12 +/or the SR-71. It used 2 each 425 CID Buick Wildcat V-8 engines turning about 3200 RPMs to start the engines on the aircraft.
During WWII, a start cart usually had a large collection of big batteries, & sometimes an engine driven generator. Some engines were started using compressed air. Their start carts had one or two large piston engines driving large air compressors.
The contingency plan to start these compressed air started engines, was to leave the engine running. Although, according to my uncle who flew B-17s, sometimes when faced with an off airfeild start for these, the mechanics used a strap wrapped around the propeller hub attached to the rear of a large (duece and a half, or five ton), truck. When the truck was driven slowly, steadily, forward (In front of & parallel to the wing), the strap would unwind from the prop hub turning the engine over. Hopefully the engine would start.
Yes, Mr Ford’s Ryan can, (& probably will), be rebuilt. At least I hope so. He will probably be ready to fly again long before his aircraft will be. The engine & prop will both need to be completely torn down, inspected, & rebuilt, or at least reassembled. I do these “Prop Strike Inspections” often. Most folks pay the minor extra amount of money that it costs to get a rebuild out of the “Inspection”. Thus they get a “Zero Time” engine. Which means that the clock resets as far as TBO is conserned. TBO = Time Between Overhaul.
IHTH, 48.
