A tragic accident which really ought not to have happened.
In my RAF time in Germany I was tasked to lift some light aluminium assault boats with a Puma, as part of an Army exercise.
I hadn't lifted this particular load before so my crewman and I dug out the relevant document, written by JATE (Joint Air Transport Establishment, then based at Brize Norton), to see if there was an officially trialled rigging scheme. The actual number of the publication escapes me, my only excuse can be that I haven't seen that document for over twenty five years (was it AP1105? LSH, CG - you can probably recall it).
There was a rigging scheme and this particular type of boat was officially classed as a "Dangerous Load", because it would fly unpredictably. It could only be flown level and ballasted, or flown as a stack of five, one boat inside the other. This stuck in my mind ever since because it was the only time I was asked to carry a boat and it was the only "Dangerous Load" I had ever come across.
Last edited by ShyTorque; 18th Jul 2019 at 16:52.