Magners,
Thank you for your reply, but I have yet to see a single post on this thread that makes any reference to the aircrew or grooundcrew in a bad light, certainly not 'bitching few posts directed at a few guys that fly the jets' as you claim. On the contrary, there has been nothing but praise for both aircrew and groundcrew alike.
I appreciate your frankness about newspaper articles and their sensationalist reporting, however, the sad fact is that they appear to have a large degree of truth in them (although I'm sure it isn't 100% factual)
But that is certainly no reason for you not to defend 'your' aircraft. I applaud you and your colleagues for standing up for the old girl. The Nimrod has been an outstanding aircraft in many respects, and I can understand your anger at hearing people (including myself) who are now apparantly giving it a hard time. But we are not really.
You must understand that many of us have flown Nimrods (myself from the early 70's up 'till the late 80's) and the vast majority of us frankly never had any problems, let alone the problems the fleet are experiencing now.
I agree with you that the bottom line is money - end of story really. Continuing defence cuts have caused enormous problems and pressures for the groundcrew to maintain the aircraft, as far as spares etc are concerned, not to mention the manpower problems. To a lesser extent, the same goes for the aircrew.
My argument, and that of most subscribers to this thread, is that the current hierachal regime cannot continue with this policy unless they are prepared to accept the very real possibility of losing another aircraft. And that should not and MUST NOT be allowed to happen.
CAS, ACAS, AOC and Stn Cdr ISK all have a responsibility and duty of care to Nimrod crews. It is high time they exercised that by grounding the fleet, in total, until the AAR and Fuel leak problems are fixed once and for all, and the aircraft is made as safe as possible once again.
Regards
The Winco