I wish to expound the factors which have contributed to the current malaise which is Air Movements at Fairford. But first I must correct some basic factual errors:
Rej’s comment on the incident at the entry to Disused South at Lyneham is only part correct. The vehicles were heading in the same direction and converged with the faster moving vehicle (The Atlas) running along the side of the forklift tearing off the Atlas side rails and dumping them on the roof of the forklift. The loads on both vehicles were thankfully undamaged. Both drivers were inexperienced and lets face it, careless, but as it appears to be impossible to discipline anyone these days what can we expect? Yes the pavement was wide enough for a C17, just as well really as ZZ-171 was parked on it at the time. Oh and yes it was a nice sunny day.
Safety_Helmet - If you havn’t got a half decent mover story where have you been all your career?
unclenelli - The 2 MT vehicle was not marshalled by a mover although a baggage party of army passengers were standing around the carousel, that duty should most likely have fallen to the vehicle escort however, he remained in the cab. The driver incidentally had 4 previous accidents in the last 2 years. Why was a roller bed kneeling trailer worth 140K (and most likely now written off) used for carting bags from FFD with a driver unfamiliar with the low carousel instead of the 7.5T vehicles and drivers provided for such bags? Something to do with 2 x 747 full passenger ac arriving within 20 minutes of each other thus exceeding the capacity of the assets available perhaps? Flow control, any of you Ops types ever heard of it?
12 twists per inch - Yes a “grown-up” albeit an acting one, did damage a 10, drove off, denied doing so when questioned, told the LAC with him to keep stum. This is now a unit enquiry which means far from being disciplined the no blame, there, there, never mind culture will no doubt take over. If a grown-up lies should he be allowed to wear the Queens Colours? By the way professional; 1 F, 2 S, (broken in wilts also take note)
The 747 was damaged by a Auxiliary Air Force JNCO, the previous day he had damaged an LDV vehicle when he drove over a grounded pallet. He subsequently admitted that he had trouble seeing objects at certain distances and should have had his eyes tested. He has a history of scrapes during his call-up period.
The movers rely heavily on the support of 4624 Sqn RAuxAF who are established for 270 reserve and 30 HQ+Trg posts but the unremitting call-up of these “war reserve” assets has caused their number to dwindle to around 95 + 30. (216 Sqn have made use of them for Op Bolthole by mis-employing 3 as drivers – hope they don’t hit anything).
And yes, there are some facile and inappropriate comments on the mover’s web site but every job has it’s idiots, some them even post on this site do they not?
Grounded So Stack is closer to the truth that he knows where Fairford is concerned when it comes to saying enough is enough but nothing is that simple is it?
The Stn Cdr called all the Movs Offrs, WO and FS together to instil his message about safety and he stated he fully supported any genuine need for delays or rescheduling - Ops Wg however, are not listening; see above flow as an example.
Often their own worst enemy the movers attempt the impossible, run around like headless chickens and then, another “F**kwit mover incident”. Perhaps eventually they will feel able to slow down, their bosses to submit a reasoned argument for doing the job safely rather than immediately, but until the internal conflict management issue is resolved the problem will remain (see below).
Would you as aircrew or technicians undertake tasks, cutting corners and taking risks as part of your every day working routine? Would your bosses encourage you to do so?
The lot of the mover at BZZ and FFD is not a happy one. Of a given shift of nominally 28 people it is usual for between 8 and 12 of those to be OOA and a further 4-6 to be on courses of between 1 and 12 weeks duration. Some shifts are so poorly manned that at FFD there is no NCO available between WO and SAC and therefore little supervision takes place, it’s more of an SAC’s cooperative.
74.6% of the SACs have less than 3 years total service. In this years promotion board BZZ may get at most 15% of the SAC-Cpl slots despite having 48% of the trades SACs – no one has enough time-in! 84% of Cpls and 78% of Sgts have less than 18 months in rank, many of these despite their junior status are acting one rank above so as to ensure that tasks that require an NCO have one even if it is someone who is in reality still very junior in the rank below.
Imagine your own workplace with a crew room full of LACs or ab initio WSOps or pilots, most of your experienced personnel in Basrah or elsewhere and a tasking schedule like Lyneham in the good old TacEval days. You turn to your most experienced member of staff who has only been with you for maybe 6 months to help, flag up your concerns to your bosses and get told to get on with it, give some of the LACs acting NCO rank and soldier on.
Those individuals with a sense of self-preservation have ensured they have been posted elsewhere leaving those less fortunate or “only here because I was offered promotion” to make do. Additional work has now been thrust upon them in the form of the Army, sorry Joint, asset tracking system “Vital”, another 1 week course, more work, no additional manpower.
OOA area dets come around every 16 months for Cpls and every 20-24 months for SACs and Sgts with this set to become worse in January.
During my University days I learned about conflict management, the signs of conflict as described in the link below are obvious amongst the movers:
http://www.nsba.org/sbot/toolkit/Conflict.html
This is compounded by the appalling personal standards of their junior “leaders”, one recently bounced a cheque to one of her airmen, (the deposit for their Christmas function I belive) no doubt nothing will be done about it. Another faxed statements concerning the 747 incident direct to the airline in contravention of SSOs and before the legal beagles had seen them. From outside these “leaders” look like an unholy alliance of the passed-over and the unlikely to achieve whose focus appears to be on sport and social activities rather then tackling the paramount issues described above.
Little wonder that the grown-ups appear to have resigned themselves to failure whilst they wait, dejected until their mortgage reaches a point where the gratuity pays it off or the kids finish school.
I have worked with the movers around the world in various guises and for many years, I know them to be professional and hard working. It is frustrating to see them at BZZ and FFD in their current state. I write this expectant of whoever in the MOD whose place it is to monitor such things as these posts passing it on to those in whose domain lies the solution to this unfortunate state of affairs.
Remember few things are as simple as they appear, so before decrying others look deeper at the real factors. After all Tony's 45 mins and WMD were drivers for us being in Iraq!