jyndabyne, thankyou for your kind words. There is of course an advantage to being a very ex member, one is able to say things that serving members may feel, for very understandable reasons, reluctant to say. I feel very reluctant to make the sort of comments that I have felt compelled to make about the service I love. It is a very difficult and unpalatable thing to do. May I suggest that others like me who have served and are as anxious as I at what they have read on this thread and other ones on this Forum should speak out. This media is very powerful and well read, nothing like it existed in my day. If we had known about the Internet no doubt it would have been hailed as the answer to all problems of communication. At a stroke the higher echelons would have early knowledge of trouble and change tack to avoid it. Well it doesn't quite seem to work like that, but we may be sure that what is written here is followed and at least noted. The arm chair Test Pilots seem to have given it a rest for the present, so now is the time for anyone with a simple desire for justice to come forward. I know nothing about Helicopters, other than that God never meant wings to go round and round, but I do know the difference between right and wrong. I am not that self satisfied to think I am in anyway alone in that regard. The one quality, if there be any, that being British means is having a sense of fairness. What has been done here is profoundly unfair and very very wrong. Let Right be Done!