Originally Posted by
Flipster130
This is the nub of it......the 'official record' is in quite clearly in error and cannot be allowed to stand - either in Scotland or Westminster......but how to get it changed?
Perhaps this should be the focus leading up to the 30th Anniversary?
A little while before I presided over an inquiry into an aircraft accident in which all on board perished. Since there were no eye witnesses and neither a CVR or ADR, evidence was necessarily incomplete. Determination of the cause relied upon some supposition but, as I observed at the time, "when you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth." But Sherlock Holmes was wrong because truth is absolute and, since all our crew had died and could not give evidence, there had to be an element of doubt, however tiny, when apportioning blame. In accordance with the legal guidance at the time, I did not find any of the crew to have been negligent (despite a lot of compelling evidence). I should think, but I don't know, that the President of the Chinook Board came to his conclusions in a similar way? I am sure, however, that he and his members did their honest best with the information they had at the time to discharge their duty in accordance with the direction of the Convening Authority. I apologise if this is obvious to other readers but the Convening Authority need not accept the findings of the Board, either in whole or part. All that became a matter of public record and it must stand. Grievance, I suggest, should be a different process.