Nunquamparatus, I too am sorry for your loss and the pain that revisiting it causes you. Like others have said the doing of it is not simply gratuitous. The purpose of Airworthiness Regulation and Accident Investigation is to avoid future avoidable accidents and the needless loss of life. Your sentiments, or similar, were expressed by ex colleagues of those who perished in the Hercules, the Nimrod and the Chinook tragedies. The Military Aviation world is a surprisingly close knit one, and like any family it resents intrusions into its private grief. Like other ex-serving members I have experienced that and can empathise with your feelings. But serving or retired we are or were all professionals and it is as professionals that we post here for a purpose, that is to avoid future avoidable accidents. We cannot do that if Airworthiness Regulations are not properly enforced or Aircraft Accidents are not effectively Investigated.
You posted:
The ATCO made the correct call, in sufficient time to both aircraft - on an unbeliveably busy circuit. The two SKs collided despite this call.
I had not realised that the frequency being used was incredibly busy. Does this not make the claim that it was not being recorded on Ark Royal all the more strange, indeed as a mere ex light blue I might say incredible? If you had told me that a major fleet unit did not routinely record and preserve as a matter of course all transmissions made in the launching and recovery of its aircraft I would find it unbelievable. Upon reflection I still do. Am I wrong? By the way, when you say that the ATCO "made the correct call" how do you know? How does anyone know if the recording does not exist? I'm not saying he didn't but simply asking; how do we know?