Thank you tuc and JTO for dotting and crossing the i's and t's for us. I would merely add that an Airworthiness Authority that suffers from "a loss of corporate memory" is an Air Safety hazard in itself. That is why Coroners' Inquests and FAI's are so vital to the UK Military Air Safety process, and will be into the foreseeable future. That is why DV's probing into why that doesn't happen is an important Air Safety contribution and should be seen as such by those who want UK Military Aviation avoidable accidents to be avoided in future.
[MOAN ON]Whether those who called for ESF protection to the Hercules fleet over the decades were lobbying, pleading, or merely moaning, a system that had investigated, specified, and even trialled such protection could not only ignore those calls but then forget the very protection system itself speaks volumes about the dysfunctional state of UK Military Air Safety.[/MOAN OFF]