Mick Strigg:
So, you say that this accident was not properly investigated!
Well, I haven't gone that far as you well know, but AI is like justice, it should not only be done but be seen to be done. How else can we have confidence in it? Let us return to my airline analogy. If all scrutiny were only on the subject accident fleet, then the possibility that it received less in the way of the airline's resources and priorities than other more favoured and prestigious fleets might never come to light. Thus the AAIB and the CAA set out to see the wood for the trees. How was this done here? It is not the business of the BoI whether Group, let alone Command, let alone the RAF, has a policy of gentle decline for an elderly fleet. I am not saying this was the case here, what I am saying is that the overall status of the Puma fleet is the responsibility of much bigger fish than the Benson Execs. Presumably if they had lived the Mull pilots would have faced Courts Martial charged with the Gross Negligence found by the Reviewing Officers. We now know that decisions made in the MOD's corridors long before their fatal flight condemned them with a very seriously unairworthy aircraft. The BoI did not "discover" that, it scarcely looked! Why should we have confidence in any other RAF Accident Investigation?
Furthermore, I'm sure that the Police, RNFSAIC, Coroner and RAF Police are thrilled to learn that, in your opinion, they are not "professional"!
And I didn't say that either, as you well know. Of the people and institutions that you list, the only one that does AI is the RNFSAIC. The trouble is they don't do RAF Investigations, merely advise them. Even if they did we come back to the well trodden ground of Terms of Reference and Independence. Theoretically they would have complete freedom in both but Mull has proved that in practise they have it in neither. The police don't do AI they investigate possible breeches of the Law, same with the RAF police and Military Law. The Coroner's don't do AI, but in carrying out their duties to investigate untoward death they take evidence from those who can cast light on Aircraft Accidents. Light that in many cases has not been seen by that BoI.