I noticed my MP has not signed, so I have written to him (ruthlessly plagiarising John Blakeley's letter - with apologies):
Dear EG's MP,
I write, as a constituent, to ask you to sign the above Early Day Motion.
At the time I was serving in the Army in Northern Ireland and several of my friends and colleagues were on board. When the Board of Inquiry reported, I assumed their finding of the aircrew to be grossly negligent to be correct.
Since then, as a result of the investigations of the Defence Select Committee, the Public Accounts Committee and the House of Lords Select Committee, I have been convinced that the verdict of the Board of Inquiry is unsafe and the position of the reviewing Air Marshals is untenable.
Detailled evidence from the Board of Inquiry shows quite clearly that, at the time, the Chinook HC2 fleet was suffering a continuing series of problems, any one of which could have caused the pilots of ZD 576 to have been either unable, or so distracted that they failed, to make the turn up the west coast of the Mull. For example a senior RAF instructor in evidence to the Board of Inquiry commented:
“The unforeseen malfunctions on the Chinook HC2 of a flight critical nature have mainly been associated with the engine system FADEC. They have resulted in undemanded engine shutdown, engine run-up, spurious engine failure captions and misleading and confusing cockpit indications.”
The problems were so severe that, just prior to the accident, the RAF's safety evaluation branch at RAF Boscombe Down had grounded the Chinook HC2 that they were evaluating due to concerns about flight safety.
Would you climb onto an airliner you knew was suffering from a wide range of "flight safety critical" false and real transient problems, and which had just been grounded by the test and certification organisation of the same "airline"?
Because they pick and choose the facts that suit them the MoD has been able to ignore all criticisms of the judgement – even that of the HoL Select Committee. The MoD’s need to keep this as a pilot error accident is clearly paramount because if it were to be found that it was not then Pandora's Box is opened on the whole process of getting the Chinook HC2 into service and the decision to use it for such a passenger flight.
The result is that MoD steadfastly sticks by this unjust and outrageous verdict, which not only broke the RAF’s rules of the time on finding deceased aircrew negligent but did so without any chance of the “guilty” pilots being able to defend themselves.
Therefore I ask that you sign the above EDM.
Yours Sincerely
EG
I await his response.
EG