Originally Posted by
idle bystander
But it is a bloody awful report, written by someone with almost no understanding of, and seemingly little interest in, the norms of carrier operations. Sharkey's point is that had the BOI been conducted by people with the appropriate experience it would have properly addressed the issues that are really behind this entirely unnecessary accident. These issues all flow from the catastrophic decision in 2000 when the Joint Force Harrier was formed and the Navy permanently gave up (was robbed of) direct control of its fixed-wing aviation, effectively reversing the Inskip Award of 1939 which returned naval aviation to where it belonged.
I guess it is career suicide for any light blue officer to suggest that naval aviation is anything more than aviation from a floating airfield, but this accident drives that point home.
Why thank you, as someone from Joint Force Harrier that worked bloody hard at trying to make it work, your comments fill me with pride….
Were you there? Was ‘Sharkey - I won the war and hate all things RAF’ there?
I was an SNCO Flight Deck Supervisor on both Invincible (once with 16 Harriers + 3 Sea Kings) and Illustrious on multiple deployments, which I think qualifies me as being SQEP to talk about life on a busy deck. I worked with some truly excellent FDOs and CFDs and we always got everything back safe.
Yes there were certainly RAF aircrew elements who were vehemently against JFH, mostly because they lost control of their train set when at sea and tried everything to stop it working, but there were just as many RN officers trying everything in their power to screw us around. At Senior Rate level we made it work, if that meant a de-brief in the Mess then that was what we did.
This whole debacle on 617 could so easily have been avoided if LfE from JFH had been employed, but it wasn’t.
We lost plenty of inflatable intake blanks until we worked out that tying them to the lashings meant they never got a ‘float test’ or we removed them during the flying period (let’s face it, once you’ve done a FOD walk, how does FOD get on the deck)?
A Liney or Plane Captain would sign the F705 to certify they have been removed and secured in a Lacon in the catwalk.
As they had been successfully at sea for months, there can be only one reason this happened, complacency brought about by fatigue. They didn’t have enough ground crew to start with, as they lost some they were not replaced. Less bodies, fatigue add in some complacency and they went straight to the scene of the accident.
This was avoidable, but no-one either had the courage to speak up, or (as I suspect) they were ignored from above when they did.
As a ‘crabmariner’ I agree, flying from a CV is a whole different ball game and needs to be respected or it will bite you.
Really glad that the armourers did their bit (as always & despite being shafted by the NEM) and that HUX continues to fly the jet.