John Blakeley
Crew Duty Time
You quoted
<<The comments of the Station Commander at Aldergrove (and also as SRAFONI responsible for authorising any CDT extension to the maximum allowable) were:
"Crew Duty Considerations- … At the time of the accident, the crew was operating within CDT extension which had been properly sought and granted (para 30b of the BOI …">>
Just to clarify this, the CDT extension granted here was only from 7 hrs to 8 hrs – to quote from one of the inquiries (AVM Day?)
<<… . So when they set out from Aldergrove to fly to Inverness, they had flown 5 hours 40 minutes and they had to finish flying by the 8 hour point or they had to get the Senior Royal Air Force Officer, Northern Ireland, Group Captain Wedge's authority to extend to 10 hours. There is no doubt the 10 hours would have allowed them to get to Inverness and back but the 8 hours did not …>>
I was present at the FAI when the Station Commander was replying to questions on this issue – he seemed to be making it very clear that no such extension had been asked for.