Torygraph:
James Blunt misses Afghanistan concert
It was meant to be a morale-boosting trip to cheer up hundreds of troops spending Christmas in Afghanistan.
Instead, international superstars James Blunt and Katherine Jenkins got a taste of the kind of problems faced by soldiers heading to and from the battlefield as they found themselves stranded for 15 hours at East Midlands airport.
The gaffes lead Mr Blunt, a former officer in the Life Guards, to tell friends that it “bad organisation, verging on incompetence” that led to the cancellation. Fortunately neither singer was aware that the antique VC10 aircraft they had boarded had been banned from taking passengers bar in exceptional circumstances because of safety fears over its ageing equipment.
The two singers joined 160 soldiers at East Midlands airport for a 7am flight on Tuesday to fly out to Helmand for a two-show tour. Mr Blunt was particularly keen to get out to Afghanistan after aircraft problems prevented him travelling last year.
An initial 90 minute delay was caused by the RAF failing to have the right equipment to load the meals on board. Once this was cleared the crew boarded only to discover that the 50-year-old aeroplane’s airborne radar system was malfunctioning. But they had to wait eight hours before they got clearance from RAF chiefs to fly without the problem fixed.
The passengers were then allowed to board shortly after 4pm but the RAF ground movers miscounted the passengers and enforced another delay because they believed they had an extra person on board.
As a result they missed their re-scheduled take-off slot for shortly after 5pm.
But the previous hold-ups meant that the aircrew were outside their duty hours and needed an enforced rest and the aircraft could not fly on its new take-off slot.
The plane had to be emptied but it took almost five hours to get everyone off as no buses could be found to off-load the troops. They were not allowed to walk to the terminal just 75 yards away.
No replacement aircrew could be found and the entire flight was cancelled.
A friend of James Blunt told The Daily Telegraph that the blunders were down to “bad organization, verging on incompetence within the structure of the RAF”.............