Have a buddy who was in helo maintenance at said army school. German army pilots have flown less than 100h a year for a good while now. Around 2010 they pushed many of the last 2000+ instructors into resigning or early retirement - not enough airworthy ac and not enough money for hours.
Not saying these two poor souls where not good pilots, not saying FAIP doesn’t work. But 450h, 1/3 of it in sim according to some sources? I am pretty sure most flyers would prefer to become seasoned operational pilots before assigned to school.
In the end it’s austerity. Everyone who is in any real life role, be it an army pilot or a nurse or a train driver, knows it: paper pushers deny the worth of slow grown real life experience and think they can withdraw funding for those who are out there every day. Their practical training, their maintenance intervals, their salaries, it’s all up for degradation all the time to save cost at all cost. But no e-learning and no raw talent will ever replace giving professional people what they need to do their jobs: good gear, time to grow and an appropriate pay.
Somebody mentioned it: German MoD in house decision making was replaced by McKinsey consultants. Tax money (billions literally) is plundered and cannonballed into consultancy and corporations but pilots can’t get a thousand operational hours. Same for all other public services.
Did I mention the minister who installed McK is von der Leyen who is set to lead the EU commission? Watch out for so much more to come. Oh, and her son is - a US McKinsey partner. So disgusting. These people are extremists, and for some they are deadly.
Edit: hope the dead pilot was knocked unconscious for she burned up in her seat.