Originally Posted by
Dominator2
There is no doubt that the F15 crews should have known AAR 8 was active, however, they were perfectly entitled to be there under see and avoid. Why 4 aircrew, two radars and interrogators failed to see the tanker is of concern?
I find it curious why the tanker pilot turned belly up to the Eagles and therefore losing sight? I’m not convinced that all pilots are trained on collision geometry and how to break a collision. Yes you may break your IRF bubble but at least moving the contacts in the windscreen will avoid metal coming together.
As to later comments in this thread concerning who has control on which frequency when conducting AAR amuses me. This argument has gone on for years and is still not resolved. Since the RAF operates throughout the world the general principle of all doing the same must prevail. I can recall numerous incidents in Bosnia, Kosovo and The Middle East where difference procedures in a multi-national coalition caused confusion. If a very experienced, strong willed individual has an opinion he should write a paper and send it to the appropriate regulating authorities.
Agreed that the F-15s should have awareness of the activity of Area 8, but the report failed to mention that the tankers have no awareness of the bookings for the Wash ATA either. A simple info exchange would solve that. But neither F-15s or tanker received any traffic information on each other from ATC, despite being under traffic information service. See and avoid was in play, and that, plus luck, is what ultimately stopped a collision.
As for why the tanker turned away, consider a pair that you are just visual with. They are in the 10 o'clock low, 5 miles climbing rapidly. TCAS then alerts you to the collision potential due to their rate of climb. Do you turn towards the rapidly blooming aircraft at your max 30 degrees angle of bank? Or away? Or just plough straight on. Tankers are not manoeuvrable especially when the closure is so fast. It takes 5 seconds to action a turn. They definitely can't 'break' to avoid! The tanker turn was initiated as the likely best course of action to avoid the F-15s, in self preservation. The tanker only had time to roll in before the encounter. Monitoring on TCAS and out the window (before the protagonist went under the nose) in the 10 seconds we had failed to mitigate any collision threat. Hence the 'luck' element alluded to in the report.