Desperate For Manpower At Isk

[bluetail]

I was speaking with a civilian pal from ISK earlier today who works on the maintenance. He told me that just recently OC Eng paid a visit to is hangar to see if any of the civilian maintenance boys would be prepared to go on Detachment in support of th Nimrod.

Apparently things are so desparate at ISK that the station cannot support detachments, the carrot was that when on detachment they would get a J/T,s daily rate on top of their normal salary.

Takers.................I gather not alot

Is the RAF joke now or what!!!!!!!!

[engineer(retard)]

From the Business section of the Telegraph today on MOD waste, "The bloated RAF sent 55 men per aircraft to the Gulf" based upon the book Lions, Donkeys and Dinosaurs written by an ex-matelot.

Now if you want to know about military aviation, you naturally listen to the views of an ex-mine disposal RN Lt. I suspect this man should be categorized as a donkey.

regards

retard

[southside]

55 men per aircraft? Is that true. If it is then its truely scandalous.

[engineer(retard)]

No surprise at your reponse given your form, I suspect you also come from the same stable.

How many personnel deploy to support a single ship with a single Merlin, if you take into account the cooks, bottle washers, stokers etc. Oh and add the RFA for the support of the ship. Taken entirely out of context, it would also be pretty scandalous, perhaps we should ask an infantry officer to write a book on maritime aviation.

[southside]

Exactly. 55 men per aircraft is a disgrace. Their airships should be hanging their heads at this one and not being able to support detachments is a sad indication of the state that we are in.

[engineer(retard)]

Compared to how many hundreds if you used my context to deploy a single Merlin. You are an air cadet and I claim my £5.

[southside]

Well, that may be the case but I'm not sure how many people it takes to deploy a merlin but I'd be surprised if they could do it with less than 55, so I take my hat of to the light blue chaps. Although I still believe the airships should be provioing the proper manpower and not running things short.

[engineer(retard)]

Unfortunately, this guy appears to be a loose cannon and for a normally supportive paper like the Telegraph to use this rubbish is disturbing. It will assist the bean counters to cut again, as the public will take it as gospel and there will be no ensuing outcry.

[Safety_Helmut]

I imagine if you simply divide the number of RAF personnel in theatre by the number of RAF aircraft deployed, you may come out with an answer like 55. Of course you will then be including people like the RAF Regiment in those calculations, who whilst doing a sterling job, they like many others, do not directly support the aircraft. So for your average punter reading the story, this doesn't look good. However, even the young ATC cadets who post on here should know better. He is an @rse !

Safety_Helmut

[bluetail]

Errr..........just to slow things down a bit, the point I am trying to make is that the RAF is so now overstretched that they (their Airships) are struggling severely due to cuts, redundancies et al to meet their plans.

ISK is surely a joke when senior staff even have to even contemplate that they support Nimrod deployments with civilian contractors.

The service manpower levels at ISK are so poor that I reckon safety must be impinged upon.

Just to put things in perpective a single Nimrod aircraft detachement for say 1 Month will require at least 30 Groundcrew to support it, a 2 ship same, will need about 40.

BT

[Safety_Helmut]

You're right bluetail ! If this is true and we can no longer support what I imagine is a planned deployment, then we are truly in a mess. Does anybody from the frozen north have any more information ?

Safety_Helmut

[southside]

The thing that surprises me is that the RAF DON'T get civvies to support them. The RN have been doing it for years. We have had civvies on detachments for donkeys....why dont the RAF ?

[Navaleye]

I'm afraid that their is something of a track record of this. Note what happened post Op Corporate. 400 ground crew rotated on a three week basis to support less than a dozen Harriers, plus C-130s. Not throwing stones, just reporting.

[Divergent Phugoid!]

Southside....

TMACASBT!!

[Phoney Tony]

In addition to those who support the platform do not forget all the ops support personnel.http://www.pprune.org/forums/images/smilies/thumbs.gif
:ok:

[ColdWarWimp]

Not surprising that OC Eng's offer of a paid holiday wasn't greeted with great joy. Most of the civvy techs working at ISK are ex SNCOs who bailed out under PVR and they still talk to the current engineering staff.

[bluetail]

ColdWarWimp

Got to agree, how niave the military staff at ISK must be, I fell into said category, and I believe I got out just in time, the staff on Northside are way brighter than those left on Southside....all have been there and done it, most if not all the rules were written by those still working in that hangar

BT