In what other air accidents have the UK Military found pilots guilty of gross professional negligence? It might be instructive to see what it has taken in the past to achieve this accolade...
The more I read of this the more it seems that the MoD used that device in an attempt to slam the door on further enquiry which they feared would lead to hugely embarrassing revelations of their gross professional misconduct in various aspects of certification and operational use of the aircraft. The amount of sitting on files and obfuscation amongst the Top Neddies is pretty damning and reeks of a big, embarrassed cover-up at the highest levels.
This upset over the word "blame" doesn't help the discussion either. The "gross professional..." epithet was eventually removed and I gather has been taken by dome to amount to absolving the pilots of all blame. I can't see how one reaches that conclusion, there are infinite levels of "blame", though responsibility is probably a better word. Thank God the civvy accident investigators avoid the blame culture entirely, the mil would do well to do so too. Still, whichever way you cook it the primary responsibility of a pilot is to keep his machine from violent impacts with the ground, and failure to achieve that is generally considered to involve some degree of less than perfect piloting (discounting catastrophic failures etc)
DB has a point re safety altitude, had a safe altitude been achieved no such accident could have taken place. I think it is rather an overreaction to suggest that statement implies blame - something that occurs whenever the B word is used here, but it is nonetheless a factual statement.
Equally, I cannot understand why anyone would plot a route to a waypoint that is on a thousand ft high rock when cloudbase is 500ft, let alone when it is also forecast to have a PROB30 of being in IMC. The next leg to Fort William as planned ran along the length of the mountainous Mull. That too is inexplicable as a VMC route though would have worked for the trip home at medium level, excepting any question of icing conditions (I'm not aware of the temps forecast). Surely if you were expecting IMC over land and had 500ft cloudbase over water you'd plot a waypoint a mile or two SW or W of the lighthouse then go to Ft William over water the whole way? Again, this isn't blame at all, just questioning what seems to me a curiously impractical style of navigation. Why one earth would you not just fly up the western coast of the Mull - it takes you where you want to go?
Too many question with answers we'll never know, but suggesting that a pilot who flies into a stuffed cloud is devoid of responsibility is taking it too far, unless you can prove - that is conclusively prove - something catastrophic or entirely beyond his control caused it. And of course no one can even start to suggest any evidence for that. Unequivocal proof works both ways.
Quid pro quo, isn't it called?
Last edited by Agaricus bisporus; 8th Apr 2014 at 14:47.