Regrettably the desire to over pitch the requirement to reinstate our LRMPA capability - which can and should be intelligently and coherently argued by those who know how we maintain maritime security - has led to some embarrassing, emotional and overstated claims in regards the abilities of MPA in searching for debris, without a datum, across a wide open ocean area (not just here, but also on Facebook, by people who really should know better).
Lets get a grip shall we.
First, Search and Rescue is not, and never was, an essential MPA task. It is nothing more and nothing less than a "nice to do"
PR mission. Let's not get emotional where the defence of the realm is at stake. We did SAR because we could, not because we had to. Whatever SAR responsibility the UK government has can be met through non-military resources - and so they should. I am of course well aware that the SAR rescue task was formally established, my (well known) point is...it was not what we there for and it was not a wartime priority.
Second, the Nimrod would have performed no better and no worse than any other MPA platform down there...although I suspect that is slightly optimistic in the MR2's case as a combination of it sh1t comms fit and relatively poor endurance would left it struggling to maintain any sort of meaningful on task period. [And if you are reading this pointy eared one...by the time the MR2 went out of service it did not have an AAR capability.] Point of order, modern MPA are optimised to look for submarines - electronically and acoustically. They ain't optimised to look for random beacons at random frequencies and if you want a good visual platform, go dig a few PBY out the desert.
Third, this sad incident has got absolutely **** all to do with this nation's requirement for an MPA capability. Let it go.
Fourth, without fail all the maritime aircrew I ever met were (and still are) bad-assed MF forged in the life school of hard knocks. Most of them will never the read the bollo posted on here, but if they did they would just LTFAO and sink another cold one.