Sad day indeed.. but lets not forget why it has happened - 13 years of a labour government to thank for that. Spend spend spend and now we are broke.
Actually it was the Conservatives who ordered the MRA4 (Nimrod2000) in the first place.
The "****" that was trying to be converted was built in the very same factory, was it not? Even so, I think its a bit of a red herring to suggest that all the woes stem from the decision to reuse Nimrod fuselages.
The term "****" was meant to highlight the state of the frames that came in for conversion, most were that badly corroded they were rebuilt from scratch a few were just scrapped. I believe a feasibility study was made to replace the whole fuse with a off the shelf A320 fuse which would have been cheaper but the MOD was having non of it.
The poor sods who are losing their jobs had been warned that Woodford would close on completion of the MRA4 program, so the writing was on the wall, and should have been even more apparent when the delays came in.
Nothing new there, but people fully expected the program to run its course.
At this stage of the game only a fvcking idiot would cancel.