dalek
The reference to the Sikorsky crash was in answer to Heathrow Harry's recent comment – read up on it and your perspective may broaden.
<<... CPLS was fitted. It took fifteen years.>> Well the complete picture regarding the fit took nearly 17 years from the crash to get – as recently as the last couple of weeks, someone let it slip in a PM that a piece of classified equipment had been removed from the wreckage. From the BOI transcript, there was only one piece of classified equipment on ZD576 and this appeared to have been CPLS.
So CPLS, a local nav kit that my analysis had predicted to have been used, was not mentioned in the AAIB report nor did not merit a mention in all those inquiries – it should have been considered by the airworthiness crowd just because it was a piece of electronics, shouldn't it? At the very least, why the hell was it not mentioned that such-and-such equipment was recovered? Mobile 'phones, pagers, etc but not a piece of nav kit!
<<3. Technical malfunction. Right place, right time, but equipment generated incorrect range.>>
CPLS also gave approximate bearing (+/- 4 degrees) – their turn at waypoint change was consistent with the ground set being out of position up the slope – a correctly functioning PRC112 being ½ a mile or so up the slope from waypoint A/LZ is the only logical explanation that explains their course change with a range error sufficient to throw them out but not so excessively beyond TANS range to waypoint A at the position of waypoint change nor their visual perception of range to the shoreline as to raise alarm – they would have biased in favour of the (local reference, precise) CPLS for small differences to what the TANS (that Tapper thought unreliable) gave and, as they were experienced in the area, what their eyes were telling them when approaching land bereft of familiar features (naff all trees, for example) and the ground texture blurred by surface mist.
<<Your theory may have some validity Walter, but you don't have evidence to back it up.>>
The evidence was the set of data and circumstances that had the crew approaching a point in a way that a reasonable crew would not have done without some type of DME reference – in the absence of any fixed navaid within reception, I was adamant that some local/portable DME set had been used far ahead of even knowing of the existence of CPLS on RAF a/c – that it later emerged that such had been fitted is surely a clear case of QED.
<<If you accepted there were alternative possibilities you would be taken more seriously.>> Oh but I did – for a couple of years: I initially flagged the possibility to the RAF and govt ministers within weeks of the crash as, had a fixed installation been referred to (I did not know at the time that there wasn't one in range), evidence of access to ground equipment may have been lost after a maintenance visit; but this was just in case, I was not blind to other possibilities, just that this angle needed to be covered; I waited patiently for the results of investigations and then sat in on the FAI in Paisley – I found that AAIB's elimination of damage by an explosion (rocket, etc) was justified by detailed examination and explanation but much of the other witnesses (MOD etc) left me with the feeling that basic analysis had not been done, much was omitted and pertinent questions were not clearly answered or indeed met with obfuscation. Years down the track, I was referred to this thread for information and the exchange of views – while I recognise that so many do not want to explore this line for whatever reason, I have found that I have needed to persevere as from time to time I do get a snippet of useful information and, as this would surely be the obvious thread for anyone interested in this crash to read, I have had to re-post certain points as they would otherwise be smothered in the general waffle. I believe the scenario that I have presented does fit with everything that is known about this crash and that, even if it is not wholly correct, it has served as a framework to construct their most likely actions from the available data.
May I suggest that so many of you know in your hearts that something fishy happened here and so you rightly feel a great injustice has been done to the pilots but the implications of a possible contrived crash are just too much for you to contemplate? - so you (collectively speaking) rant against the legal niceties or the airworthiness, like a bull at the red cloak. I have said for years that you do not have to buy the whole conspiracy thing but in following this unpalatable line we have progressed understanding of the circumstances – it may well be just a case of an exercise gone wrong that would have embarrassed your service but we really need to know all there is to know.
<<2. Simple misunderstanding. Man on ground not in the place crew thought he would be.>> so whoever this was and whoever was responsible for the planning of the exercise should be the ones guilty – gets the pilots' names cleared automatically, doesn't it?