The real failure lies in MoD's inability to read across from one platform to another. I came across the same problem with hot air pipes in Nimrod. The same pipe "lagging" had caused a fire on a Tornado (ZA599, 17 May 02), but no one had told the Nimrod office; result 14 dead.
This systemic failure was notified within the Chief Engineer’s organisation (AMSO) in late 1992 when it was announced the necessary, mandated procedures would no longer be implemented, in order to save money. Shut down was in June 1993. No compensatory provision was made, and instead of a central authority existing to ensure such notifications were made, project offices were forcibly stove-piped.
In 1999 Director General Air Systems 2 was advised to order a fleet inspection of Tornado (in the first instance) because of this precise problem; this time on IFF. This was brought about by another project office and Boscombe Down discovering that the IFF office routinely failed to integrate warning systems, rendering aircraft vulnerable to friendly fire. They had stated “It works on the bench, so it’ll work in the aircraft”, thus at a stroke ignoring every principle of systems integration and functional safety. He (Fauset) refused, ruling it quite acceptable to knowingly deliver a functionally unsafe aircraft to the Services. The Chief of Defence Procurement (Walmsley) later upheld this ruling; which DE&S upheld no less than 3 times last year. In 2002 another 2 Star, XD5 (Porter), was similarly advised. He, too, refused.
In 2003 ZG710 was shot down, which the senior Reviewing Officer (Burridge) confirmed would have been avoided had the safety work been carried out. (It was actually cheaper to do it properly first time around. DGAS2 dug his heels in as to admit the aircraft was unsafe would have upset those who committed fraud).
All the above was presented to Haddon-Cave and Lord Philip.
We’ve been here before and the lessons are being ignored.