BAES Report
Whilst people can argue about the numbers of fires/smoke incidents until the cows come home, and I only have the Press figures to go on, and in truth the actual number is not particularly relevant, I note that very few are picking up on the real point - namely that the IPT commissioned a Design Authority (BAES) Report back in 2004 which came up with some significant recommendations to bring the chances of fire/explosion down to what BAES considered an ALARP level (although even here they hedged their bets by saying the sample investigated was small) and that few, if any, of these recommendations were taken up. Worse, in some cases the recommendations have not been actioned for the MR4.
The fact that the Nimrod has been involved in saving many lives at sea, including an incident today that could have turned very nasty, is relevant to the case for having an aircraft and trained crews available for this essential role - it is not an excuse for using an aircraft that may not be fully airworthy. Let us hope that with such a small fleet of Nimrod 4s, with numbers being driven by cost and not OA, we will still have enough resources to continue as we do now.
JB