John, i will have a look at handling the big jets, i should have read it by now really..
my statement about new airliners not being flown by easa/faa test pilots was more of a question, i dont know that much about certification. but i had a feeling that the way civil planes were qualified was very different to the military process, with the regulator providing oversight, rather than actual man power and facilities to conduct its own testing.
the reason i brought it up was because with the fast jet squadron leaving boscombe down and the general decrease in military aircraft numbers and programs (and in the context of the report into the nimrod accident, which i'm told didnt paint a great pricture of the status quo for the MOD/QinetiQ airworthiness process), i wondered whether the powers that be were thinking in terms of systemic change.