Nimrod crash in Afghanistan Tech/Info/Discussion (NOT condolences)

[JessTheDog]

Nige,
Stick your drivel up your sanctimonious @rse.
I am a Seaking pilot. Are you? I knew the aircrew. Did you?
It is not an IR strobe as anybody who knew anything about the aircaft would know if they hadn't got all their knowledge about a subject from reading frankly b@llox BOI's and Coroners inquiry's (unairworthy for 30 odd years, what c@ck!)

Drivel is in my opinion what this thread is full of anyway
I don't subscribe to Bouy 15's view that the families of the nimrod crew are after compensation, however, I honestly believe that that whilst their motives are good, their campaign is detrimental to current serving members of the armed forces.

The military must always fight with what it has, not what it would like to have, and our leaders chose to use Nimrod safe or not. It is part of being in the military that your leaders may knowingly send you on missions that you may not return from. Sometimes the mission is important enough to risk the aircraft and crew.
I do not understand why you all seem tobelieve that aircrew should not be subjected to the same risks as the troops on the ground.
Leaders must have the right to make tough decisions involving others lives, and even more importantly must be safe from legal action even if wrong in their decision. Could you imagine winning the second world war if every death caused an inquiry?
A leader who is watching his back will win nothing, and the legal costs of this and numerous other actions will all come out of our small budget.
Everyone involved was in the military. It comes with the territory.

Utterly ridiculous. There is something known as the "military covenant" that this government treats with contempt, which nevertheless provides an expectation of appropriate equipment amongst other things in return for risking one's life. Airworthiness of an aircraft should be viewed in exactly the same way as lack of body armour and NBC equipment, unservicable rifles - the key difference is that these shortcomings can be resolved far more quickly than aircraft technical problems. The military covenant has recently been given teeth by Mr Justice Collins' ruling on the applicability of HRA to troops in theatre, so if any lives are lost due to equipment failures or the lack of equipment, then the MoD are clearly liable. This is not about the fog of war, measures of last resoort as a direct threat to this nation, or commanders making a decision which with hindsight turns out to be wrong - it is about our Armed Forces being criminally starved of resources and pushed in to every coalition operation that there is, regardless of fitness to fight.

Even if you generally view lives as expendable in wartime, then the technical and operational knowledge and experience of the crews serving in the Nimrod (and other airframes) is a loss that can never be fully recovered. Also, the airframe and components - one of a very small fleet - should not be viewed so cheaply. Airframes should simply not fall out of the sky - these are not "accidents". We live in an age of force multiplication. During World War 2, losses of 100 ac on a bombing raid were viewed as acceptable because there were 1,000 ac dispatched and also because of different values of society and the fact the nation was at total war. An infantryman may be killed in action without taking the rest of his section with him - not so for aircraft where the entire crew (front and back) will be lost.

A note on capability - SHAR was removed from service early due to costs, leaving the fleet with no fixed-wing air defence...fine until it's needed and the GR9 isn't up to the job! So it is OK to remove a capability when money is involved, not when lives are involved.....

[Unsworth]

@ Tourist

Drivel is in my opinion what this thread is full of anyway

Well you don't have to participate.

The military must always fight with what it has, not what it would like to have, and our leaders chose to use Nimrod safe or not. It is part of being in the military that your leaders may knowingly send you on missions that you may not return from. Sometimes the mission is important enough to risk the aircraft and crew.

Your blind faith is touching.

I do not understand why you all seem to believe that aircrew should not be subjected to the same risks as the troops on the ground.

Is that what was said? And just who are 'you all'?

Could you imagine winning the second world war if every death caused an inquiry?

So all deaths no matter how caused are acceptable?

Everyone involved was in the military. It comes with the territory.

So it's just too bad then?

Do you believe that those who make decisions as to the use and design of equipment bear no moral responsibility for their actions? Maybe you do.

[Pontius Navigator]

While it may be acceptable in operations to send troops into harms way and indeed in training for operations too.

To send troops into a situation, in training, where risks are ignored is to open oneself to a charge of corporate manslaughter.

To send the Nimrod on operations is therefore an operational risk outside the scope of corporate manslaughter. Similarly to practise, for the same operation, in a way that places lives at risk is acceptable if that is the only means of preparation.

To conduct a routine training evolution with equipment that has a known risk of failure and killing those using it would open up the commander to a charge of corporate manslaughter.

At least that is how I understood the brief I had last week.

A couple of examples from the past. The Valiant was grounded as it was unsafe. It would probably have been able to conduct a war operation but the training risk was deemed too high.

The Comet 2 was authorised to fly with a cabin pressure of 25k as an acceptable risk. In the event the risk mitigation worked.

In Malta the MT fleet had contaminated brake fluid. The only mitigation was a notice telling of this contamination and to drive carefully. Given the way the Maltese used to drive you could argue that that was an unacceptable risk. I don't know of the accidents due to faulty brakes but today that risk would have stopped the fleet.

The issue thus is simple, not is the Nimrod FIT for operations but is it SAFE for training.

[OmegaV6]

Methinks some people are deliberately trying to confuse

Airworthy - in compliance with regulation(s)

Safe - in compliance with Risk(s) Analysis

Serviceable - in compliance with servicing schedule(s)

3 totally seperate functions

[Tappers Dad]

BBC PM Programme
Broadcast on Radio 4 Fri 23 May - 17:00
Question-Was the MOD to blame for this Accident . Answer -Bob Ainsworth- YES this aircraft had been flying for many years with a fundimental design fault.

Listen to it here it takes about 40 secs to download.

[Chugalug2]

MadBob Post#857

Mod As Self Regulator Of Airworthiness

At the risk of thread creep what is the view of the MOD being both the end user and arbiter of whether its aircraft are airworthy or not.

I am not an expert here but surely in Civvy Street it is not allowed, nor would it be considered good practice, for an airline to set airworthiness standards for its ac. The airworthiness standards are set by the FAA, CAA, JAA or whoever and policed accordingly in a way that seperates the responsibilities between the operator and the enforcer.

It would seem that the MOD has the final say whether an ac, be it Nimrod, Herc, VC10 or whatever (all now getting very, very long-in-the-tooth) is still safe to fly or not. Surely this is a conflict of interest that can't continue. I think that this was also an issue in the RAN Shark 02 BOI where the RAN had run-down spares and support for their Sea King fleet anticipating a withdrawal from service that never happened. Result was old ac, shortage of spares, canibalisation, over-stretch in maintenance departments leading to short-cuts on the job to keep the cabs flying....sounds all too familiar.

Maybe there needs to be an independent body (perhaps QinetiQ) to oversee the airworthiness standards and remove the MOD's conflict of interest before there are more Coroner's inquests. There must be others on PPRuNe who could expand on this thought....it might even be worthy of becoming a new thread.

MB

MB

Good Post Sir! I have pushed this view not only on this thread but the Hercules one as well. My solution is for a separate MAA, but whatever it is called and however it is created it needs to be outside the MOD and fully independent. Who pays? The taxpayer of course. Safety costs money, the MOD won't/can't spend it so an MAA must. You won't get much acknowledgement here, rather "A man has to do what a man has to do" guff. Once the RAF saw Flight Safety as a force maintainer, ie it endeavoured to avoid avoidable accidents. Now it appears "**** happens, OK?". The whole application of Military Airworthiness needs to be in independent hands, fast!

[FE Hoppy]

chugalug

The problem arises in the level of acceptable risk which will vary with the type of ops required.

If the risk is acceptable one day but not the next who decides? a MAA as you sujest must only have safety in mind where as the authorising authority will always balance risk against requirement.

Where does the buck stop? When an ac is lost on ops deemed not safe by the MAA but acceptable by the authoriser does that then make the authorises guilty of manslaughter?

Who would accept the position of authorising against the advice of the MAA?

It just wouldn't work.

[nigegilb]

Would be a start to have airworthy military aircraft equating to civilian safety levels.

2nd point would be to establish minimum levels of defensive equipment before going into theatre, instead of the usual MoD exemptions.

Establish those 2 points and I don't see any problem with taking on risky missions.

Remember, enemy action had nothing to do with the deaths of 14 men on XV230. Likewise the Sea King collision, Tornado shoot down etc etc.

Nimrod MR2 does not even have TCAS Hoppy, and a very sharp Coroner has just decreed that MR2 is not airworthy and of course, been ignored.

Can you honestly say what we have now is actually working?

We could at least be looking at the idea.

"Mr. Ian Liddell-Grainger (Bridgwater) (Con): The Secretary of State is aware that Europe is trying to have a military aviation authority. Will he explain why Rolls-Royce, which has been pushing the Government to accept this standard for years, has been ignored? Will the Government sign up to the European military aviation authority, to bring military aircraft in line with civil aviation? If there is a problem, what is it? Will the Minister sign up to this as soon as possible?

Des Browne: I shall consider the issue the hon. Gentleman raises. I am not in a position today to give him a detailed response, but I shall write to him on it."

[cornish-stormrider]

FE Hoppy, I'm afraid your argument sounds like the aviation equivalent of the soldier who went on patrol with a weapon known to explode every 1 in 10,000 rounds....... It's an acceptable risk shooting 9,999 rounds and then running away.

The MAA's mandate is for an aircraft to be able to perform a mission as designed/specified to and that it is reasonably safe to do so. I.e. it's not going to explode or have a wing fall off unexpectedly.

With that in mind, the MAA say plane no good, RAF fix plane and fly it. it does not turn into MAA say plane no good, auth say bugger that and we fly it anyway.

It is about having an independant office whose only responsiblity is to the poor b4st4rds flying in the jet, not to some desk driving shiny arse in whitehall.

[Da4orce]

OmegaV6 - 100% Clarity

Methinks some people are deliberately trying to confuse

Airworthy - in compliance with regulation(s)

Safe - in compliance with Risk(s) Analysis

Serviceable - in compliance with servicing schedule(s)

3 totally seperate functions

I doubt that many would question whether individual jets were not serviceable. That's not in question.

Safe and Airworthy seems to be the sticking point!

Congrats to Radio 4 for a great interview with Bob Ainsworth, no punches pulled and squirming galore

[Mad (Flt) Scientist]

Just to add a comment to the post above (by Da4orce) (and I agree, I think some are misusing the terms somewhat).

Not all non-airworthy aircraft crash, and not all unsafe aircraft do either.

Absence of an accident is definitely not evidence of airworthiness or safety; it may simply be evidence of LUCK.

If I may add another civil example, to the discussion of "mission risk" versus basic "airworthiness risk" if you will ... the civil regulations implicitly recognise that there are levels of risk which are acceptable to different extents dependent upon the mission. Hence there are multiple "parts" to, for exqample, the US FARs, with the risk level which is acceptable for one Part being rather lower or higher than that for another. The extreme would perhaps be what is called "restricted" category, which applies to, for example, firefighting aircraft, where there is in effect a presumption that a higher level of "airworthiness risk" is acceptable, given the mission risk and overall benefit of the mission.

I think the key is that any acceptance of increased risk be a conscious decision taken in knowledge of the facts, not something that occurs by default or by accident.

[Chugalug2]

FE Hoppy: If the risk is acceptable one day but not the next who decides? a MAA as you sujest must only have safety in mind where as the authorising authority will always balance risk against requirement

I envisage that the MAA would have Airworthiness in mind, ie military aircraft would be supplied and kept airworthy. Of course it would be a Commander's call to send unairworthy and/or unserviceable aircraft into action if he so deemed. But he would account for that within the regulations to the MAA, a rather more grave version of the exercise of "Commander's Discretion" in the civilian system. In other words the need for Operational Necessity would be recognised and allowed for in the MAA setup.

[Unsworth]

I think the key is that any acceptance of increased risk be a conscious decision taken in knowledge of the facts, not something that occurs by default or by accident.

If there is 'increased' risk it follows that there is a baseline of risk. The precise nature of that baseline is currently open to conjecture. However as I understand it the Nimrod was not doing anything which was not routine when things suddenly went disastrous.

[Safeware]

Maybe there needs to be an independent body (perhaps QinetiQ)

Such a bad idea to have QQ on 2 fronts.

Firstly, they are a defence contractor. Picture the scene "No the Squid from SAEB isn't airworthy, but if you were to take our solution...."

Secondly, they would effectively become their own regulator, albeit on a much smaller scale than the MOD as a whole.

An independent body would have to wrestle with the twin issues of design and operational airworthiness. Meeting a set of design airworthiness and safety criteria is one thing, matching that to an operational need is another.

sw

[OilCan]

Just supposing the 'grounding' lobby were to succeed, do we;

a) Ground the fleet, rip them apart, change all the seals, put them back together again and call them safe.

or

b) Ground the fleet and scrap them.

...or is there another option?

If a) then who does it?
If b) then what do we do instead?

[Pontius Navigator]

Oilcan,

Option B of course. Option B sees an immediate saving in cash and manpower. Then we take a capability holiday (CAS's term) until MRA4 is on stream.

Seriously, I don't see Option B as an option as we can't afford an alternative in either time or cash.

Option A, for similar reasons won't wash either.

That said, if push came to shove money would be found.

ALFENS is about to die; MFMIS crashed and burnt; money was found to buy EAMS off the shelf AND install broadband connections and all in a 5 month timescale.

[OilCan]

PN ta,

If a) then who does it?

[Tappers Dad]

Oilcan

...or is there another option?

Yes make one airworthy and fly it then make another, then another etc...

Who wil do the work Qinetic, BAE. FRA SYSTEMS perhaps ?

Cost ? Gp Capt Hickman IPTL said money was not an issue when it comes to making the ac safe.

[OilCan]

TD

good idea. Can you put a time estimate on that?

[Safeware]

TD,

Yes make one airworthy and fly it then make another, then another etc...

Seems ok, but you can make an individual aircraft "airworthy" or "safe" by the implementation of limitations or procedures, thereby applying a sticking plaster. The issue here is more of the management of airworthiness across the whole fleet.

sw