Originally Posted by LarryBible

This is correct. Aircraft receive an Airworthiness Certificate after post production testing. They go through annual inspections which involve disassembly and thorough inspection and whatever maintenance necessary. The aircraft MUST pass inspection and be have airworthiness directives up to date to maintain their legal as well practical airworthiness. All this must be done to maintain the validity of the Airworthiness Certificate. There are many aspects of the ongoing airworthiness of a plane and the necessary logs that are too lengthy to explain here. They are better maintained than any car you ever saw.

Any pilot with common sense ENSURES that inspections and maintenance are kept up with. The thought of something going wrong with the aircraft in flight is sobering to any pilot. It takes me 15 minutes to do a preflight inspection before I go up for any amount of time. It's MY butt in that plane, and I've kind of gotten attached to living.

In the case of the Mustang, a typical uninformed news reporter said that the trim tab broke. The trim tab has minimal effect on aircraft control and can be overridden. It might be that the elevator control broke. I fully expect the NTSB and FAA to get to the bottom of it.

Outlawing a plane because it is old would be as big brother as outlawing air races because someone might get hurt. This is the USA.