POSIDRIVE
The best thing to do is acquaint yourself with the extensive amount of information available (quite a lot on the www)
But briefly:
1) There was no requirement to climb at all. The route could have been flown to Inverness along the Great Glen, 1-200' above sea level. Infact the restricted icing clearance of this 'improved' Mk2, made it unlikely the crew would have contemplated a premeditated IFR climb at all.
2) The crew were almost certainly using RNS252 Supertans as their prime means of navigation. You may recall this has a GPS feed, which according to the manufacturers Racal, and Trimble, was providing remarkably accurate information.
3) This piece of navigation equipment "never designed to record historical data" was used by senior officers as a rudimentary Data Recorder (They even had the cheek to refer to it as a 'black box' in front of the HoL committee! This suggested a change of selected waypoint from Wpt1 (MoK lighthouse) to Wpt2 (Corran). The change occuring less than 2nm from Wpt1. the subsequent displayed nav data commanded a left turn to Corran, at, and presumably - though we can't be certain, upto, the time of powerdown.
4) The Captain (non handling) made an unanswered radio call to Scottish Mil during the sea transit. I am unsure why the nature of the pax would have made a call to Prestwick SOP.
5) As far as getting a radar service from the SAR crew, this was planned as a VFR flight, so how would that have worked?
6) Spatial awareness, engine failures, this is all speculation/supposition. In the very finest traditions of the Royal Air Force, the test that has to be satisfied is that of "absolutely no doubt whatsoever" before deceased aircrew can be found negligent. I can only presume that is due to the fact that they are no longer with us to give their version of events. A version which could be quite different to our limited understanding.
7) Here's hoping for a just result tomorrow. The families have said they will accept the result whatever it may be. I find it difficult to believe the MOD could take any further direct hits on this tragic saga without the whole sorry edifice crumbling around their ears. But then again!!
[ 04 February 2002: Message edited by: Tandemrotor ]</p>