Nimrod crash in Afghanistan Tech/Info/Discussion (NOT condolences)

[themightyimp]

Firstly, I extended my deepest sympathy and condolences to the family and friends of those who lost their lives.

I am a practising, qualified, safety engineer. I am also in the RAF. I have dealt with several IPTs and projects, both those in service and those in the process of being introduced. I wholeheartedly agree with the findings of the H-C report . In my experience, the personnel with day-to-day responsibility within the IPTs are poorly (if at all) trained in functional safety, they are not paid much and some have no interest at all. To be fair there are a few (the honourable minority) who are the opposite.

Let's put this into context. There is a shortage in the UK of Engineers. There is a significant shortage of safety engineers. Every job I applied for (I am leaving) I was offered. Not because I am the bees-knees but because I am qualified and competent. Against this background the salaries being offered are equivalent to SO2/SO1. Paying a civil servant in an IPT at, say, C1 level means that in a highly competitive recruiting environment the MoD is offering less than half the market rate. There is a saying about peanuts.... As I said though I have also met some dilligent, hard working personnel also.

So where am I going with this? I have written safety cases basing them on risks and hazards which the operators presented to me. I then did the behind the scenes safety work to demonstrate (or not) whether the system was acceptably safe. On one major project it was not - this was raised and the response? We'll accept the risk. Fair enough. They get the money (DACOS level) and they take the risk. However, according to the rules & regulations they are not allowed to (in this case) . I worked hard (that's what I am paid for); the operators identified the major risk; I documented and presented it; it was ignored. The thing that gets me? A simple procedural change would have solved it with no cash outlay just time and training. Against this I decided to leave.

Against all of this there is a "safety-fog". Why on earth we have an explicit name/process for something which used to be called good design, good maintenance, listening to people, heeding what the operators say and then having the money to fix it. Ah, oh well there goes that theory!

Apologies for the long post. Frustration reigns supreme. Hopefully, Charles Ness will undertake the necessary culture change - the one required at the top. More importantly some political leadership would be welcomed. Ainsworth should do the honourable thing and resign. It would cost him nothing, restore his pride, improve the image of a rotten political elite and, hopefully, give an crumb of comfort to those who have lost the most - the families.

[Col_onHF]

I for one, am glad that someone has at last & with authority, shouted out the equivalent of
" The emperor has no clothes on . . ! ! ! ! "

it has taken too long, and sadly taken too many away.

[hello1]

LL,

Have a look at Haddon-Cave's CV - the Govt knew who it was getting to do the Nimrod Review but probably didn't actually understand how bad things were/are. Well there ain't much hiding from the truth now! Excellent report.

I see aspects of the behaviours that H-C identified on a weekly, if not daily basis and if they're honest with you (and themselves) most people in DE&S will admit this. I'm not suggesting that the disgraceful disregard for doing your job properly is prevalent but the culture is crap and needs fixing (oh no more change). Overall, the way that the UK buys military aircraft is a disgrace. The government has been told it several times and has done nothing substantive to change it.

The problem is fundamentally that there is not enough resource - money/people/talent to do what is required. You can spot it in almost every project.

On a separate tack......................the discussion of fuel seals was fascinatingly alarming - anyone else wondering whether safety critical bits of their aircraft have been produced off-spec by a company that had no idea of the intended use?

[GOLF_BRAVO_ZULU]

I’m not a fan of civilian Coroners pontificating on military matters. I do think, though, that yer man Haddon-Cave’s paper doesn’t exactly fall into that category. He still makes the grand statements and the indignant theatricals we expect from QCs but the underlying factual presentation exposes the threadbare structures that support the kit we field operationally.

We spend bloody thousands on “bullying awareness” training, yet we still see it, from Parliament downwards. Certainly Civil Servants who, following Government policy, manage their own careers, will be very keenly aware of their promotion prospects and the cloud of “restoring efficiency” being parked over them. These are, in the main, just ordinary people who don’t have the resilience and disregard for self survival that the likes of a Nelson or many deployed Service types possess. They risk manage their careers somewhat better than they risk manage their work. That is the revelation H-C makes.

Nobody ever expects the cheese holes to line up to become a smoking hole in the ground (or a smoking compartment under the sea) when you're trying to earn a living and retain a career under those circumstances. The Civil Service example is easy but don't we regularly see it in the Military and Industry?

[tucumseh]

themightyimp

Good post

In my experience, the personnel with day-to-day responsibility within the IPTs are poorly (if at all) trained in functional safety,

In 1998 the DPA Director General in charge of, inter alia, Nimrod MRA4 ruled, in writing, that it was sufficient to ensure physical safety, but the contract could be paid off and the (false) statement made stating the aircraft was safe, in the full knowledge it was not functionally safe. This was upheld by the Chief of Defence Procurement. The statement that it was unsafe was made by Boscombe Down but, as we know from Chinook, they are routinely ignored. (Did I mention the same DG was in charge of Chinook? You’d think lessons would be learned).


GBZ

They risk manage their careers somewhat better than they risk manage their work. That is the revelation H-C makes.

Not a revelation to those who work with them, I’m afraid. The system, especially now, with 2 year tours for civilians, is such that many cherry pick posts, targeting jobs where the risks have been mitigated or where the work has reverted to managing tasks which you’ve carried out at a lower grade. A typical example would be after full development, when there is an aircraft to convert. A routine task for those aspiring to jobs in procurement (or was).

The net result is DE&S has a hierarchy who have not been tested in the organisation’s primary role – delivering equipment to time, cost and performance. Looking at the staff list at IPTL and above, I’m hard pressed to find any who have initiated and completed a project, and done everything in between. Or who have been head down in an engine bay cursing crap tools and non-existent tech pubs.



I fear it grinds you down, no matter how hard you try. I can trace my deep cynicism, and utter loathing of the Stars I mention, to one day in 2002 when I was asked to present on systems integration to an entire IPT. When I got to the Def Stan that lays down the procedures for maintaining the build standard, which is a mandated pre-requisite for a valid safety case (which is what the H-C report is all about), I was shouted down – almost to a man they had been taught, over many years, that maintaining and being able to demonstrate safety was a “waste of money”. The only man who supported me was, surprise, ex-D/Air Armaments. He knew exactly what I was talking about. One man in a whole IPT, but himself nearing retirement. I now look at that IPTL’s boss and just know things have got worse. In fact, you read the obituaries almost every day.

[Distant Voice]

It is good to see, on page 334, that H-C gives a ruling on "Tolerably safe and not ALARP" --- There is no such thing. This blows apart the Des Browne statement (after being advised by senior officers), made during his BOI announcement in 2007; "QinetiQ has conducted an independent investigation into the fuel system and confirmed that, in light of the measures taken since the crash, the fuel system is safe to operate".

His announcement was based on a QinetiQ report which states in the final paragraph of the Executive Summary; "Having considered the evidence referenced within this safety case report, noting that there are outstanding recommendations and the level of risk present to the fuel system is not ALARP, the operation of the fuel system is tolerably safe given the currently in place"

I believe that this statement, which as I have said is the last item in the Summary, was added for political reasons to keep the Nimrod flying, and came from outside QinetiQ. It is not in keeping with the rest of the report. "Tolerably Safe" is never used in the body, and it is clear from reading the report that QinetiQ understand the ALARP and safety concept. The draft version of this report was circulated in Sept 2007, but all copies have been destroyed. In this instance I believe H-C was wrong to attack QinetIQ on this point; he should have looked higher up the chain.

DV

[nigegilb]

Which is what we stated at the time DV. Pity all the safety experts who agree with H-C now, were so silent at the time.

For "tolerably safe", read "military risk", but we are not man enough to call it that. The words "military risk", had to be squeezed out of Ollis at the Hercules Inquest. Strange, he was very happy and quick to use the option at the time. Typical for what goes as political and military leadership. Let's hope forthcoming court battles over article two, increasingly take this option for doing nothing about safety away from senior officers who never have to expose themselves to excessive risk.

For all those who think this is a one day storm, you might be disappointed. Looking forward to tomorrow's papers....I also suspect the articles may be a little more harder edged than the jack nicko "sympathy" angle.

[Jackonicko]

It's not so much sympathy as disgust that decent, honourable men are being hung out to dry, while those who set their terms of reference, and who shaped the role of the modern IPTL (not least by their treatment of Lang) get away without a word of criticism.

Perhaps Baber and Pledger deserve some criticism - but far harsher criticism is deserved by the successive Governments and Ministers who encouraged the drift towards using IPTs as a simple conduit for funnelling work (and risk) to the Design Authority, and towards reducing the independent role of QinetiQ, and who actively discouraged IPTs from showing any independent thought or initiative.

[nigegilb]

Well I agree with part of your post J-N, that is the responsibility that shoud be being attached to others in this affair. I have received astonishing evidence in the form of a letter to MP/Ingram in 2005 saying exactly what H-C does....

Of course, Ingram did nothing with this information, he simply ignored it. Which is not surprising, it is my opinion that Ingram should answer a charge of malfeasance in public office over the Hercules affair. He repeatedly stated that all Hercs being sent to Afghanistan had a suite of defensive aids which was so far from the truth it was laughable. Ingram misled the public and Parliament on that occasion.

Going back to Baber, his was not a wilful misuse of his responsibilities, he appears to have been less than competent in their application. The mistake Baber made was "admitting" he was responsible for Nimrod airworthiness. Wrong. It is Secretary of State. The regs state he doesn't delegate responsibility, but authority to implement regs. Semantics perhaps, but at a stroke he protected all above him. The implication is that Baber was in charge of his own destiny, which he was not. Bet he regrets that now. If nailed in court, he might well use that defence.

Ingram and I would argue Ollis were much more cynical. In short, if you are going to take extremely high risks with other people's lives, you HAVE to take full responsibility when people are killed. These people have responsibility for oversight, if that oversight is negligent then they MUST face the full force of court action. The people complaining about naming and shaming are usually involved in the system and have enjoyed complete absence of accountability and anonymity in the past. Haddon-Cave has, thankfully, introduced a system of accountability and identification which will eliminate the anonymity and lack of accountability that previous inquests and investigations have allowed.

Ingram's response relating to the Hercules affair, was to deny those levels of risk were being taken in the first place, which leads one to believe that there must have been collusion between Ministers and the MoD. Military officers will be much more aware in the future, that their chances of explaining their actions in court are that much higher, with the associated career damage.

I fully support the naming of these "culpable" people and hopefully it will lead to a cautionary approach to safety instead of the recklessness highlighted by a string of fatal accidents.

[Epimetheus]

Further to Boozydragon at 1634 and glad rag at 1649, it has become increasingly perceived by OC Eng Wgs and ESWs that they must do more than just deliver the eng piece of the unit to be credible in the Stn Cdr's eyes. Despite the privilege of having so many under command, if they haven't been seen to make org changes or cut manpower to deliver financial efficiencies at unit level their paranoia convinces them that they aren't doing enough. Just maintaining the status quo? Forget it. And the WOs and SNCOs are driven to torment by the officers' 2-year posting cycle and reinvention of oh-so-many wheels.

[Biggus]

Regarding the comment from TD...


"We received a letter from No 2 Group today stating:

You may be particularly concerned to know what action will be taken against those who have been criticised in the report. The individuals still serving in the RAF are no longer employed in roles with any connection to airworthiness or safety..."

I can appreciate that they are not currently in jobs "specifically" relating to Flight Safety, so perhaps the statement is correct. However, during my many years in the RAF the Flight Safety mantra drilled into me was that Flight Safety was everyone's responsibility, with accompanying films showing the impact on Flight Safety that cooks, stewards, policeman (the Benny Hill soundtrack as an RAF policeman cycled to the tower to report he had just seen an aircraft taxying past with a panel loose/red flag) etc, can all have. Surely simply by being (very) senior officers in the RAF, they have a responsibility, albeit maybe not directly, towards Flight Safety on an everyday basis.

Maybe I am being unnecessarily "picky" - no doubt someone will put me right shortly!

[Satellite_Driver]

The Haddon-Cave report is as many here have noted a welcome and long overdue examination of the way that airworthiness culture, and indeed engineering culture as a whole, has been undermined in the last decade and a half of relentless change. I mentioned in an earlier comment that as a former Eng Officer (1990-2007) I clearly recognised many of the problems highlighted. I've now had a chance to read the whole report in detail and my views have only been reinforced. Unfortunately, we now have the problem of how we're going to dig ourselves out of this hole.

I joined as a University Cadet in the late 1980s. I spent part of each summer on attachment to the Eng Wg at a MOB, getting practical experience of line and bay engineering work. After IOT, and before engineering training, I did a three-week workshop practical course (where I learned that if I want something welded, I should find someone who knows how to weld!) In those days, EngO training was delivered via the EOT1/EOT2 system, with EOT1 being a six-month course covering all areas of engineering relevant to the RAF irrespective of your degree or whether you were heading into the Aerosystems or Comms-Electronics specialisations of the branch, so despite having graduated in electronics I came out of EOT1 with at least a basic knowledge of aircraft structures, propulsion and flight control systems. The course finished with the three-week 'Hangar Phase' where we worked on a mock squadron of half a dozen Hunters and a Jag, so that - again, irrespective of specialisation - everyone got some exposure to the basics of running an aircraft line. Flight safety management was hammered into all of us - one student I know got a hats-on with the Commandant for doing a quick bodge on a DS-induced fault during a pressured turn-around instead of snagging it. After our first tours we came back for EOT2, which did have separate AS and CE streams but had a common engineering management module which again included flight safety training.

Since then though EOT has been progressively 'refined' and now new EngOs will do either AS or CE versions of EOFT, meaning that about a third of EngO's will not get practical experience or training on aircraft. Whilst I understand the argument about the cost of teaching students material that they may well not directly use in their first couple of tours, it seems essential to me that RAF Engineering officers, who will often end up irrespective of specialisation in jobs involving or connected with air engineering, should have a grounding in the field.

Furthermore, when I entered productive service there was a range of opportunities for EngOs to build their professional competence throughout their careers. It was assumed that after tours at first and second line, third-tour EngOs would usually be put into EA or Role Office posts with the express intent that they would use the knowledge and experienced gained in practical engineering management. Whilst there was even twenty years ago a debate on how essential Chartered Engineer status was (it seemed to depend on whether OC Eng Trg at DSGT was a CEng or not) it was certainly encouraged. For the particularly technically-inclined, there were a fair number of 'starred appointments', involving a year as a (well-paid!) student followed by three years in a specialist post in procurement, industry or (sshh!) DIS. Perhaps most importantly the Eng Branch had specialist support and consultancy organisations such as AMDS and RIU that were specifically established to take on ad-hoc engineering and logistics tasks that required resources and skills not available within a station's Eng Wg.

As the Haddon-Cave report emphasises, the mid-1990s was a high point for airworthiness management and, in broader terms, professional engineering, in the RAF. We had a 3-star Chief Engineer, with a well-defined role and a solid Branch structure underneath him. Things were by no means perfect; in particular, over-establishment of what we'd now call SO2 posts led to a serious glut of sqn ldr posts and as a result both a shortage of competent experienced flt lts (because if you were one then unless you'd been caught with the AOC's daughter you got promoted) and murderous competition to reach wg cdr. Of course, in a culture where engineering management still meant 'managing the actual engineering' the latter may not have been altogether a bad thing.

It didn't last, as H-C notes. His report refers in detail to the whirlwind of change that followed SDR. I left RIU in early 2000, just as it was being assimilated by the Borg (aka DCSA) and the writing was already on the wall - DCSA had to achieve manpower savings, and a large lump of blue-suiters doing jobs that surely could be handled by civilian consultants was an obvious place to start. I spent the next 18 months in a job that took me well out of the mainstream and by the time I put my uniform back on I returned to a very different Eng Branch. Indeed, it soon became clear that rather than being an RAF Engineer I was now a DLO Engineer who happened to have a light-blue uniform. The final six years of my RAF service were spent in SO2 jobs in three different IPTs. These IPTs (for the record, they were Defence Information Infrastructure, Satellite Communications and Logistics Applications) all had their own eccentricities and peculiarities but they all had the following in common to a greater or lesser extent:

- Blithe ignorance of traditional engineering and procurement management practices.
- Obsession with Key Performance Indicators and Change Management.
- An attitude towards uniformed personnel varying from suspicion to outright resentment.
- Fixation on outsourcing not just actual support work but also management and even policy.
- Worst of all, a pervasive intellectual inferiority complex that seemed to assume that only expensive external consultants were capable of having good ideas.

The combination of these factors led to a bizarre situation where we set ourselves up as the 'intelligent customer' of contractors and then promptly outsourced our intelligence to them. It seemed that the ideal IPT approach was to pay a contractor to do a job, then pay him to define the performance indicators for how well that job was being done, then pay him to produce pretty graphs showing that all these PIs were green. The best thing about this approach of course was that it required no actual skill or knowledge as to what the contractor was doing, thus encouraging the sort of 'agile' and 'flexible' career path that got you places in DLO. I well recall a visit from the new IPT leader when I was running the LITS platform upgrade. A submarine designer by profession, he wanted to know why on earth the team running RAF aircraft spares management systems needed so many uniformed RAF personnel? That was typical of the way that the presence of uniformed personnel in IPTs was seen as almost disruptive. We were expensive (an SO2 costs a lot more than the notionally-equivalent civil servant) and were prone to be away for weeks or months at a time on frivolous diversions such as ICSC or detachment to Iraq.

I won't repeat H-C's very accurate observations of the effect all this had on Eng Branch morale and career management. I certainly saw for myself the creeping pressure to conform to a DLO-compatible career path, comprising as many tours of as short a length as reasonably possible (no more than two years, for sure) in a wide range of different areas. Now it's always been true that it's a good idea to get a range of experience, but the progressive de-skilling of managerial jobs in IPTS meant, in my view, that in fact incumbents were just doing very similar jobs - overseeing outsourced contracts - in a disjointed set of environments. As front-line jobs were lost, I saw JOs coming straight out of training into jobs that a decade earlier would only ever have been filled by a third-tourist. (And I know that PMA, as it then was, was unhappy about this - but where else could they post them?) Meanwhile, specialist jobs where expertise could be built were prime candidates for disestablishment, whilst ambitious JOs were warned that such starred appointments as remained might have a bad effect on their career prospects; not only did you risk being labelled a 'specialist', but you would only do one tour in the time competitors for promotion had done two.

The H-C report makes a number of very cogent recommendations aimed at restoring a culture of informed and involved engineering professionalism in the RAF and DLO. To these, I would add a plea to reverse the steady erosion of posts in which junior and mid-level EngOs can develop their engineering expertise. There is certainly nothing wrong with the calibre of people entering the Branch; indeed, the modern IOT and JOCC are arguably far better than the version of my day, whilst the operational tempo means that almost all officers will have extensive deployed forward experience. (Although there is a risk that prolonged deployed ops can lead to bad habits - the H-C report noted the decline in standards of aircraft husbandry over the last decade.) But for these JOs to continue to develop as responsible and competent engineers they need to have the opportunity to gain and use such specialist knowledge without being seen to sidetrack their careers.

Finally, one factor that (unless I missed it) H-C did not mention was the move a few years ago to a common General Duties branch for all officers at wg cdr and above. Whilst I can understand the reasoning behind this there is a risk of creating a mindset that the Eng Branch stops at sqn ldr. This may be administratively true, but you won't see a pilot thinking that he's no longer aircrew just because he's reached wg cdr and gone from the Flying to the GD branch! Assuming that H-C's recommendation to reinstitute a full-time dedicated Chief Engineer is accepted, one of the CE's key duties should be to cultivate a mindset that an Engineer Officer remains, at heart, an engineer no matter how senior or general his or her employment.

[Flitzer]

Is it any wonder one of these balls was dropped? The Wing Commander engineer's repsonsibilities were described in the H-C report;

"a very heavy workload which included:
(1) line management responsibilities for individuals at Chadderton, RAF Kinloss and RAF Wyton;
(2) BLSC and SMP for
the Battle of Britain Memorial Flight;
(3) preparation of a Life Extension paper on the Nimrod;
(4) negotiating
NISC 3 which was intended to produce savings on support contracts;
(5) costs comparisons between the MR2
and MR4;
(6) managing the switch to an ‘equalised’ maintenance policy, which was intended to produce
savings of £8,000,000;
(7) responsibility for aspects of maintenance at RAF Kinloss following the acquisition
of responsibility for Depth by the Nimrod IPT;
(8) dealing with maintenance backlogs due to the extension of
the MR2 out of service date; and
(9) dealing with changes to the operational use of the Nimrod following the
addition of equipment for use in Afghanistan and Iraq.

In addition, his workload was exacerbated by manpower
and resources issues within the IPT, in particular posts being left ‘gapped’."
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Whilst it is possible to prioritise the above none of these activities are trivial.

How many managers and staff would it take to do all of the above properly?

[Tappers Dad]

Biggus
Are you saying I should trust what I am being told by N0 2 Group ?

Let me think er NO I don't take anything as being true I am told until I am sure it is so.

[Rigga]

TD
Glad to hear you have learned one of the Forces Mantra's - "Dont believe it until your (Home/There/Got it/...)".



... To respond to some other comments:

"There is a shortage in the UK of Engineers."

I believe there has been an increase in the number of jobs available for UK engineers - due mainly to two things:
1. The outsourcing of MOD work has taken a good deal of ex-servicemen (normally a large source of LAE's) to work where they used to work in uniform - and for far less than they could earn, but in an area of their choice.
2. The establishment of new MRO's in the middle-east and far-east has taken a good deal of workers to tax-free salaries.


Someone on this thread (cant find it now) said something like "A lot of people here are openly agreeing with H-C but they didnt say anything previously"

Totally wrong!
In the Forces there has NEVER been an independant and/or trustworthy way of raising serious concerns from the shop floor to the higher echelons. "They" didnt want to know what the shop floor says and EngO's only put forward what they think should go through! (an unnecessary filter?)

AISTR there is only a few ways to send disagreements upwards in the forces - and they were renowned for being 'lost' at lower levels.

760/765 systems are probably still under-resourced, and lack any real flow, sometimes taking years before any action is seen and with no feedback to originators as to how they are progressing (probably because they dont progress) So staff will become used to seeing the wrong info in maitenance procedures and may not use them because they have no faith in them, and "guessing" (in that can-do attitude) what should be done because there is no feedback of what they should do.

I'm on a rant now - so I'll get me coat and go for a beer.

[Safeware]

Just came across this:

"But he has confirmed to me that his report does not raise concerns over the actual airworthiness of individual fleets.

.... because that wasn't in his TORs

"And I have been assured by the Chief of the Air Staff and the Defence Chief Airworthiness Engineer that our fleets remain safe to fly.

... a bold, but necessary statement?

from here: Ministry of Defence | Defence News | Defence Policy and Business | Ainsworth apologises for loss of Nimrod XV230

sw

[nigegilb]

Another front opens up tonight;

MoD sent men to die in ‘unsafe’ helicopter

Michael Smith

The overruling of aircraft safety warnings by the Ministry of Defence resulted in the deaths of six British servicemen in a helicopter crash, a senior official has revealed.

He also alleged that documents were withheld from the board of inquiry and the inquest to cover up the way in which airworthiness regulations were ignored. The former civil servant said he had refused to declare the Royal Navy’s Sea King Mk7 helicopters airworthy, but was overruled by superiors trying to save money.

He said that two years before two Sea Kings collided off Iraq in 2003, killing six Royal Navy officers and one American serviceman, he issued warnings about the risks. Anti-collision lights on Sea Kings had been replaced with strobe lights that “blinded the pilots at low level, over water or in mist — so they switched them off”. Consequently, the pilots lost sight of each other before the fatal collision, and became disorientated. A board of inquiry blamed the crash on several factors and ordered removal of the strobe lights.

Last night the mother of Marc Lawrence, 26, one of the Royal Navy officers killed, accused the MoD of a “whitewash”. Ann Lawrence said: “The inquest was a case of people forgetting where they were and losing key papers. It was a joke.”

Yesterday it emerged that Lieutenant Colonel Rupert Thorneloe, the most senior British officer to have died in Afghanistan, had warned his superiors that helicopter operations there were “not fit for purpose”.

[nigegilb]

And this morning;
Just to add that Mick has been tireless in his detailed reporting of XV230. Journos take a fair old bashing on this forum, but it would seem that this journalist is not phased by continually coming back to a subject that had "been done" many times before.


Servicemen betrayed by shortcuts over Nimrod's safety


Michael Smith

IT was three years ago this weekend when I revealed in this newspaper that a fuel leak on an ageing RAF Nimrod had caused an explosion that killed 14 British servicemen.

The fuel had leaked into the fuselage of the plane, which was on a mission near Kandahar in southern Afghanistan, and then ignited, possibly because of an electrical fault. The crew put out a Mayday call but they never stood a chance. The crash, in September 2006, remains the worst loss of life suffered by British forces in Afghanistan.

At the time I believed it was an unpredictable accident, that nobody would be found personally to blame, that nobody would have sent the crew up knowing the equipment was unsafe. I thought government ministers, senior RAF officers and civil servants would want to get to the bottom of the affair and sort it out to ensure nobody else died needlessly.

However, as news of further incidents of fuel leaks emerged, along with evidence from leaked e-mails and reports of the warnings that this was an accident waiting to happen, it slowly became clear that senior officers were making unthinkable decisions.

RELATED LINKS
Defence chiefs blamed for jet crash that killed 14
Nimrod report: the men in the frame
Hemmed in by rapidly shrinking budgets, they were sending servicemen and women to war in aircraft and vehicles that were simply not safe. Worse, nobody seemed to care.

Numerous warnings had been ignored. BAE Systems, the aircraft’s manufacturer, was rightly characterised last week by Charles Haddon-Cave, QC, in his devastating review of the disaster as “a company in denial” over Nimrod. But three years before the accident it had told the Ministry of Defence (MoD) that the aircraft needed fire-suppression systems fitted to make it safe. The suggestion was ignored on grounds of cost.

To a former serviceman who trusted the authorities to ensure that while we did our job they would protect us, it seemed the ultimate betrayal. Even in the aftermath of the crash, the RAF seemed to be ignoring reality. In an e-mail written shortly afterwards and reported by The Sunday Times, an RAF officer complained that the way in which crews were being kept in the dark was making matters worse.

The Nimrod had exploded just after air-to-air refuelling from a tanker plane, yet the officer indicated that the procedure was still being undertaken just days after the crash. “We’ve not heard a dicky bird then suddenly the ACC [air component commander] in the Gulf wants us airborne and tanker capable again,” he wrote. “So, we had a jet air-to-air refuelling over Kandahar four days after the accident!! Unbelievable.”

E-mails from staff at the Nimrod base at RAF Kinloss in Morayshire showed morale had collapsed. “It’s not a nice place to work just now,” one Nimrod crew member said.

By now the families of victims were becoming vociferous in expressing their concerns over the MoD’s apparent refusal to accept that anything was wrong. Graham Knight, the father of Sergeant Ben Knight, one of those killed, was leading what at times seemed a one-man campaign to find out what had happened. He was repeatedly stalled by officialdom.

The truth slowly emerged, however. In July 2007, The Sunday Times learnt that a year before the loss of the Nimrod, after a previous fuel leak, the station commander at Kinloss had warned that an “unexpected failure” was likely with a plane already 10 years past its out-of-service date.

A senior RAF officer said in a report into the leak that it was “a particular concern as the ageing Nimrod MR2 is extended beyond its original out-of-service date” of 1995. Meanwhile, the MoD continued to insist that “the Nimrod has an excellent safety record and is airworthy and fit to fly”.

It was little surprise when, after the board of inquiry confirmed that a catastrophic and predictable fuel leak had caused the loss of Nimrod XV230, that Des Browne, then defence secretary, provided civil servants to “assist” Haddon-Cave in his independent review of the affair.

Like many of the families I believed this was simply another cover-up. The report would be massaged by senior RAF officers sent in to work with Haddon-Cave. There was some reassurance in the way Haddon-Cave gathered evidence from former service officers and civil servants who were critical of the MoD’s lax approach to airworthiness. But it could not prepare anyone for the coruscating judgment he handed down last week.

Not only did he name officials and companies who had palpably failed to do their jobs, and as a result bore some responsibility for the deaths of the 14 men, he also categorically refuted the government’s spin that it has repeatedly increased defence budgets and that safety within the armed forces is not being undermined.

His most damning verdict was not solely about Nimrod, however. Working on evidence from a wide range of officials — including the former civil servant who today reveals the failure to apply airworthiness regulations on two Sea King helicopters that collided in Iraq — Haddon-Cave attacked the MoD’s entire airworthiness system as “not fit for purpose”.

He cited “a failure to adhere to basic principles” and a culture that put budgets above safety — a verdict that more than vindicated the Sunday Times campaign.

[nigegilb]

Another journo who has taken an interest in airworthiness issues is Andrew Johnson, this is his take on recent events in today's Indy.

MoD's Nimrod disgrace
After cost-cutting is blamed in devastating report on air crash that killed 14, ministry seeks further 'efficiency savings'

By Andrew Johnson
Sunday, 1 November 2009SHARE PRINTEMAILTEXT SIZE
The devastating report into the Nimrod crash that killed 14 service personnel in Afghanistan in 2006 may have sent shockwaves through Whitehall, but it will not have surprised RAF personnel who believe that at least four other fatal crashes can be blamed on cost-cutting.

Charles Haddon-Cave QC used his report to accuse the Ministry of Defence of "a systematic breach of the Military Covenant" for putting its savings drive ahead of air safety. And yesterday the issue of helicopter shortages was highlighted by a leaked memo written by Lieutenant Colonel Rupert Thorneloe, who was killed in Afghanistan in July. He had cautioned that too many troops were being transported by roads, just weeks before he fell victim to a roadside bomb.

The Nimrod's safety record and issues at the centre of other fatal crashes have been highlighted by The Independent on Sunday over the past three years as part of its Military Covenant campaign.

Military pilots also highlight the collision of two Sea King helicopters in March 2003 that killed seven servicemen. A system to help pilots to spot other helicopters at night was switched off because it was fitted incorrectly and interfered with their sight.

Shortly afterwards a Tornado jet was shot down by in a "friendly fire" incident because of a known flaw in the identification system. Both crew members died. In 2005 10 people died when a Hercules transport plane was shot down. It had not been fitted with explosion-suppressant foam, which could have saved it, despite recommendations that it should be.

Two years later a Puma helicopter crashed, killing two crew. At the inquest in August the pilot said the aircraft was missing a vital piece of safety equipment and was not airworthy.

Next month safety will again come under scrutiny when a legal action brought by the relatives of the Hercules victims will be heard, while the inquest into the two men who died in the Puma crash resumes.

The Nimrod families are also pursuing a court action against the MoD, and are considering a corporate manslaughter action against BAE Systems and the defence company QinetiQ, which were also criticised by Mr Haddon-Cave.

With families of soldiers killed in Land Rovers also suing on the grounds that equipment shortages amounted to a breach of Article 2 of the Human Rights Act – the right to life – it opens up a potential Pandora's box of litigation, according to John Cooper, the barrister representing the Nimrod, Hercules and Puma families.

Air Commodore George Baber, the RAF officer in charge of the Nimrod safety check, was criticised in the report for "failing to make safety his first priority". Two months prior to the crash Air Commodore Baber had been put in charge of airworthiness for every plane and helicopter in the fleet.

Despite questions about the aircraft's safety record being raised after the explosion, Air Commodore Baber was not removed until a few months ago – after Mr Haddon-Cave informed those he intended to criticise.

Graham Knight, whose son Ben was one of those killed on the Nimrod, said the MoD was still "in denial".

"They gave the head of the Nimrod squadron an MBE for building morale after the crash," he said.

Despite the report pinning the Nimrod disaster on efficiency savings and the use of private companies, the MoD is poised to announce further cuts by outsourcing the support of front-line troops. A confidential briefing sent to MoD managers last week said: "Past efficiencies have been derived from a range of innovative arrangements with industry. The review encourages the adoption of these arrangements more broadly."

Steve Jary, the national secretary of Prospect, the union that represents MoD staff, said: "It is astonishing that the MoD is going ahead with this, just a week after the report into the Nimrod disaster. That report was a wake-up call to think again about the effect of constant change programmes, cuts and privatisation. It seems the MoD will never learn and will continue to put the lives of service personnel at unnecessary risk."

An MoD spokesman said: "Air Commodore Baber is no longer employed in a role with any connection to airworthiness or safety."

[Distant Voice]

Attack on the Coroner

For me the one "cloud" over the H-C report is the "attack" on the Coroner's finding regarding the possible source of the fuel. The report returns to the "blow-off" theory, which, according to the BOI "Circumstantial evidence suggested that the former [overflow] was the probable source of fuel" (not 50-50, as stated in the H-C report). Having now completed my reading of the report, I find the so called "new evidence" flawed and selective. (examples below)

The report talks about an incident in Dec 2006 (Incident 066/06) and claims that, "no convincing explanation for the fuel leak could be determined." Yet 066/06 Air Incident report states that "When the refuel gallery was pressurised to 20 psi a fuel leak was observed.......The leak rate was 25 drips per min. Pipe work seals to be examined and replaced as necessary." This is twice the rate set for an "unacceptable leak" (see page 76 of the report). The rate is likely to have been much higher during AAR with pressure around 50 psi. For me, this seem a convining explanation for fuel in the bomb bay.

The report fails to mention Air Incident 060/06, Nov 2006. The report on this states "Leak confirmed from cross feed pipe as 12 drips per min static, 42 drips per min under pressure from ac pumps" AND "No 1 tk blow off valve was also examined for evidence of fuel being released. There was no fuel evident in the area of the blow off valve"

The report gives little coverage of the 2007 incident involving XV235, other than to say "A crew member noticed what appeared to be spray emitting from the fuel system". In fact what was reported was "Approximately 20 seconds after requesting the Carter pump on, the crew member who was monitoring the bomb bay through the periscope reported fuel spraying into the bomb bay and fluid lying on the bomb bay doors. The bomb bay periscope was manned as this was the first AR flight the aircraft had undertaken since an FRS coupling change in Oct 07. The crew member and the captain had discussed this pre flight and had identified the area of the new FRS coupling". The FRS coupling had been changed because a leak had been found during ground testing (RTI/NIM/170). Ground Incident Report, 902/007 was raised, but this is not mentioned in the H-C report.

There is mention of a dye test carried out in 2006 (New evidence?). The report makes no mention of whether this fluid was ejected under pressure, as per a blow-off, or simply released from the aircraft. Rain will track down the outside of the aircraft.

Sorry, my money is still with the Coroner. I can not find anything convincing from H-C technical adviser (President of the BOI). Fuel in the bomb bay arrived from fuel leaks in the bomb bay. There are many more examples to support the Coroner's theory which I have not mentioned, and are certainly not mentioned in the H-C report.

DV