Originally Posted by
tucumseh
So, 10 years after Sean Cunningham died, when it was obvious any safety case could not be valid, and it was later admitted one couldn't be found, we've progressed to it's a bag of nails. Does anyone in MoD see the link to the demise of the ATC gliders, managed by the same people?
Or the parallels with Nimrod MRA4, where it too didn't have a valid safety case; and when the task was eventually resurrected it was discovered that the warnings of 1995 were correct - it could never be valid?
How could the Hawk and Glider teams, or anyone remotely connected with them, have passed supposedly robust MAA audits since 2010?
Yet another fleet being scrapped, or perhaps given away to someone who knows how to do the job, yet no-one seems answerable. Am I alone in suspecting the money 'saved' is earmarked for other aircraft fleets which have similar problems and are deemed more important?
A fleet that does such essential work is scrapped (with the ever noted exception of the Reds to indicate that this decision isn't an issue with the type per se, so much as a broader one concerning spares shortages and the costs of maintaining an aged fleet. Now DuckDodgers spells out the (even greater?) costs of ensuring that the essential work continues. Am I alone in smelling a rat here or is it rather the odour of decomposing fish? The ACO gliders were 'paused', but turned out to be unairworthy. The Nimrods were scrapped, and our Maritime Air Reconnaissance capability 'paused'. Costs were blamed but again airworthiness proved to be the culprit. Now it is the turn of the Hawk T1, but nothing to see here because it is simply the cost of keeping them flying that is to blame and the Red Arrows will continue with them anyway (aided presumably by the abundance of spares suddenly becoming available). As Tuc reminds us, Sean Cunningham's seat, and hence his T1, were unairworthy and he died as a result of that (HSE's bizarre prosecution of MB not withstanding). Did the T1 ever regain airworthiness? If so, how was that achieved? Or or is this fleet merely following the same old weary pattern of culling fleets that the MAA has given up on?