falcon - I don't think your speculation is that wild, although whether the gauges were fully functioning or faulty, there are enough belts & braces in the system that it's almost certain that they set off with an accurate 400kgs, since the higher level fuel quantity will have been regularly tested & evidenced by endurance, & it 's only the lower levels that are infrequently visited and therefore tested for accuracy. In addition, the fuel flow rate, time airborne and fuel recovered all make sense.
All Police pilots re-calculate fuel remaining & distance/time to the nearest fuelling point on a very frequent basis, certainly every time they arrive on task and more frequently the further away from fuel you are!
In addition, pilots will/should have briefed their endurance to MLA at each shift brief, and re-briefed if they've changed fuel loading in the interim. As a result, all crew/pax will know when they took-off & therefore when they should be back on the ground. This endurance will form part of a pilots calculation back-stop when looking at his apparent remaining fuel.
There was enough fuel recovered, albeit below MLA, to have got them back to base. The critical thing is that we don't know which tank/s it was in.
Last edited by zorab64; 17th Jan 2014 at 12:14.
Reason: typo