It's gratifying to see the universal support here. Also, that MoD's apologists and the wilder conspiracy theorists have chosen to stay away.
May I just say to those new to this, it is important to understand that, after the findings were set aside in 2011, MoD admitted that the Chinook Mk2 fleet had no lawful clearance to fly, but this was withheld from aircrew and passengers.
The evidence that Lord Philip accepted is feely available, and a summary has been published.
https://sites.google.com/site/milita...-disgrace-2016
Regarding the records the current petition seeks to retain, MoD has only provided assurance (to Lady Hermon) that
'Ministry of Defence records relating to the crash of the RAF helicopter Chinook that were closed between the date of the accident on 2 June 1994 and 1995 have been preserved'. Those familiar with MoD-speak will know this is bollox. What files were closed when there was a 17-year campaign, during which MoD employed a dedicated 4-man team just to reply to (but seldom answer) questions?
And, given the above admission, what of the crucial files from October/November 1993? Before 2 June 1994, they were held in 'Chinook Mid-Life-Update' (sic) files, primarily at Boscombe Down and the Directorate of Helicopter Projects in St Giles Court, London. The Air Staff and ACM Wratten's outfit would have selected extracts, primarily those affecting the yet to be issued Release to Service; telling them it wasn't allowed to be issued and why. (We know the latter knew this, because a few weeks after the accident it replied to a letter from Boscombe spelling it out). To paraphrase:
You know that aircraft that crashed the other week? Can you please hurry up and declare it airworthy. That fact it wasn't rather places us in the **** if it ever gets out. It did get out, eventually.
Very soon after the accident, it was recognised these files constituted direct evidence. Either they would be heavily referenced in the accident files or, likely, copied and inserted. That MoD later denied their existence suggests files have indeed been destroyed. That does not mean it was a deliberate act of concealment. I was in DHP when we moved to Abbey Wood in July 1996. The vast majority of our files went missing, despite telling security and movers that they should be retained. But a simple phone call to Bristol confirmed that the promised army of staff scanning files to achieve a 'paper-free environment' simply didn't exist. The floor plate allocated to them in 1995 was re-assigned to the video conferencing suite. In my case I was lucky. I parked myself at my contractors and spent weeks copying their archives. Not sure about Chinook; but believe me, their rooms full of cabinets in St Giles were, like mine, replaced with a 4-drawer cabinet shared between numerous projects. And the vital HQ Mods Committees records (a primary part of the airworthiness audit trail) had already been ditched in June 1991. Quite important, when the Mk2 programme had kicked off in the 80s. This is why the most relevant evidence to Lord Philip was from Boscombe files, not MoD(PE) or Air Staff.