Caz:
On 14 May 1940 Nos 12, 103,105,150 and 218 Sqns equipped with Battles attacked German Pontoon Bridges at Sedan. 40 aircraft out of a force of 71 were lost.
The courage of those brave men who were sacrificed in such a forlorn and unequal struggle, and knew it, is legend caz, and you do well to remind us of it. But at least those who lost their lives did so at the hands of the enemy. No such presence existed (Walter's "spooks" not withstanding) in the tragedy that is the subject of this thread, nor for that matter with the Nimrod tragedy, nor for that matter the 2 Sea Kings' collision. The sole enemy presence in the case of the Hercules was in all probability a single round that penetrated an unprotected fuel tank. Those three cases had one thing in common, which
AFAIK the Battles did not share, that is a lack of airworthiness. To my mind that makes those 60 deaths even more of a tragedy as it concerned not the exigencies of war but the Gross Negligence of senior commanders and was completely avoidable.