Air Cadets grounded?
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Tomorrow at the RAeS
Airworthiness & Maintenance Group Workshop
How can the integrity of airworthiness accountability be ensured through contracts for services?
Speakers from Serco, their training provider Baines Simmons and the RAF, with a lawyer.
5 Issues were identified that
affected airworthiness in the context of sub-contracted services:
The Definition of Accountability
The understanding of the definition of accountability varies between organisations. Different outsourcing models make it ever more challenging.
Organisational Complexity
Complex and bespoke arrangements, especially in the military context, between organisations in the supply chain mean that outputs are unpredictable when designing a support solution and it is difficult for one individual to be certain of compliance.
Contracts and Agreements
Formal agreements between operators, CAMOs, HUA providers etc are key to improving the way accountability and clarity is assured. There is a need to focus more on interfaces and the product. Hence
Contracts/IBAs/SLAs are key to this and should help to underpin assurance, although it shouldn’t be forgotten that they will only work if backed up with good communications and relationships.
Approvals and Oversight
Approvals are only good at ‘the point when the ink is drying’. Accountable managers need to review them personally and to examine their context to understand whether they can be relied upon – eg how old is the approval? This requirement for oversight activity needs to be included in formal arrangements. ‘Performance
Based Environment’ is the title of an EASA document which will place a requirement on accountable managers to ensure that their management system is effective.
Evidence for Decision Making
In many situations there is a lack of evidence to underpin airworthiness decisions. An example is the situation
with pooled parts. This issue is less of a hazard when parts are new but increases with age. Building in access to evidence, eg strip reports, reliability reports, QMS outputs at the contract stage is key.
Relationship building also plays a key part. If the CAMO does not have access to the QMS outputs then they will need to be replicated.
See more at: Royal Aeronautical Society | Event | Airworthiness & Maintenance Group Workshop
Airworthiness & Maintenance Group Workshop
How can the integrity of airworthiness accountability be ensured through contracts for services?
Speakers from Serco, their training provider Baines Simmons and the RAF, with a lawyer.
This half day workshop will build upon the outcomes of the last Airworthiness & Maintenance Group conference which was entitled 'Outsourcing Aircraft Support = Abdicating the Airworthiness Accountability?' and took place in October 2014. This event explored accountability and responsibility for airworthiness in the context of sub-contracted services.
5 Issues were identified that
affected airworthiness in the context of sub-contracted services:
The Definition of Accountability
The understanding of the definition of accountability varies between organisations. Different outsourcing models make it ever more challenging.
Organisational Complexity
Complex and bespoke arrangements, especially in the military context, between organisations in the supply chain mean that outputs are unpredictable when designing a support solution and it is difficult for one individual to be certain of compliance.
Contracts and Agreements
Formal agreements between operators, CAMOs, HUA providers etc are key to improving the way accountability and clarity is assured. There is a need to focus more on interfaces and the product. Hence
Contracts/IBAs/SLAs are key to this and should help to underpin assurance, although it shouldn’t be forgotten that they will only work if backed up with good communications and relationships.
Approvals and Oversight
Approvals are only good at ‘the point when the ink is drying’. Accountable managers need to review them personally and to examine their context to understand whether they can be relied upon – eg how old is the approval? This requirement for oversight activity needs to be included in formal arrangements. ‘Performance
Based Environment’ is the title of an EASA document which will place a requirement on accountable managers to ensure that their management system is effective.
Evidence for Decision Making
In many situations there is a lack of evidence to underpin airworthiness decisions. An example is the situation
with pooled parts. This issue is less of a hazard when parts are new but increases with age. Building in access to evidence, eg strip reports, reliability reports, QMS outputs at the contract stage is key.
Relationship building also plays a key part. If the CAMO does not have access to the QMS outputs then they will need to be replicated.
See more at: Royal Aeronautical Society | Event | Airworthiness & Maintenance Group Workshop
Probably more than just lacking compliance monitoring in this particular case SM !
Good communications and relationships are completely missing in this case - they are vital and it is a team effort to get aircraft out of the door these days !
Of course how hard people try rather depends on what the required end game actually is !
Good communications and relationships are completely missing in this case - they are vital and it is a team effort to get aircraft out of the door these days !
Contracts/IBAs/SLAs are key to this and should help to underpin assurance, although it shouldn’t be forgotten that they will only work if backed up with good communications and relationships.
CM:-
What is missing (never mind "seems") in UK Military Airworthiness compliance (never mind "monitoring") are an independent Regulator and an independent Investigator, both of the Operator (the MOD) and of each other. How is compliance supposed to work when the Regulations are thrown onto the scrap heap by those whose duty it is to enforce them?
What seems to be missing in this sorry case is effective compliance monitoring.
So, as I see it,:
On the one hand,the qualification and certification paperwork trail, required procedures and necessarily involved entities continues to ever expand . On the other hand, the Nation's original capacity to build all its own military and civilian aircraft has continued to decline, to the extent that it is now unable to produce , not even a basic trainer, but even an acceptable indigenous powered glider to meet its own local commitments.
Unfair to so many I know, some who will smile at my obvious naivete , but it resonates in my tiny skull........
On the one hand,the qualification and certification paperwork trail, required procedures and necessarily involved entities continues to ever expand . On the other hand, the Nation's original capacity to build all its own military and civilian aircraft has continued to decline, to the extent that it is now unable to produce , not even a basic trainer, but even an acceptable indigenous powered glider to meet its own local commitments.
Unfair to so many I know, some who will smile at my obvious naivete , but it resonates in my tiny skull........
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Haraka
While you exaggerate the situation somewhat you are headed in the right direction, the situation within the whole of UK industry is one of endless meetings with the only firm decision to have another meeting, the participants are fearful of any decision that could be attributed to them personally and so aim to push any sort of decision so far down the line that no one can remember who decided it was a good idea.
A charismatic and firm leader is what is required to kill the meeting culture dead, the best example I can think of is John Bloor who has taken Triumph Motorcycles from a basket case to a serious international success........ But it took twenty years to do so.
A charismatic and firm leader is what is required to kill the meeting culture dead, the best example I can think of is John Bloor who has taken Triumph Motorcycles from a basket case to a serious international success........ But it took twenty years to do so.
Thought police antagonist
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Given the many and varied sentiments expressed on this thread, there is a certain unintended and unfortunate irony to the theme (s) of this years Cosford Air Show..
Themes
It will be interesting to see what appears, on the ground, and in the air, therefore.
Themes
It will be interesting to see what appears, on the ground, and in the air, therefore.
75th Anniversay Theme
Quite cunning plan.
Plenty of original T61 Ventures (in original scheme) that can be asked to 'fly in' for a 'reunion'.No chance of another sudden 'pausing' to spoil the day and lots of machines on show to impress the public.Well done Baldrick and we do not even have to check with Syerston. Chippies can aerotow in 621 Historic flight just to finish the job. A wonderful tribute to common sense and a real Venture Adventure.
Plenty of original T61 Ventures (in original scheme) that can be asked to 'fly in' for a 'reunion'.No chance of another sudden 'pausing' to spoil the day and lots of machines on show to impress the public.Well done Baldrick and we do not even have to check with Syerston. Chippies can aerotow in 621 Historic flight just to finish the job. A wonderful tribute to common sense and a real Venture Adventure.
Gentleman Aviator
And I believe that there are also plans to have at Cosford (civilian owned) Chippies and Bulldogs in AEF (Raspberry Ripple) colours .........
Re post 1041
When we went to Innsbruck a couple of years ago, I was surprised to see they were winch launching gliders to the north side of the runway at Innsbruck International Airport. The gliders kept to the north side, and didn't get in the way when EasyJet etc were trogging in and out. Never happen here though, will it??
A and C:-
Nail, hammer, hammer, nail! The MOD has got itself into a deadend as far as Military Airworthiness is concerned. Having ordered the suborning of Regulation and Enforcement, as well as ensuring the compliance of Investigation, its solution now is the MAA/MilAAIB, which will ensure that the dysfunction simply continues. Why does it do that? Simply to protect those who first caused the sabotage of Military Air Safety and those who have covered it up since. The system has to be rebuilt from the ground up and outwith the MOD, which is an Air Safety hazard in its own right.
As you say, it needs a leader to make that happen, another Trenchard, Dowding, or indeed Bloor. The rot permeates the body military, with many tainted by association, others have seen their careers ruined, their health broken, for daring to resist illegal orders. There is now at least enough common sense not to needlessly risk non-military lives (cadets in this case), which is an improvement on the reckless use of a grossly and knowingly unairworthy aircraft to take 25 pax fishing. Yet another tragedy that has never been properly investigated, where evidence was suppressed, where willing witnesses were not called, where deceased crew were made scapegoats for a decade and a half.
Someone has to tackle this situation which has now morphed into the pointless bureaucratic paper shuffling exercise complained of here. Someone...?
A charismatic and firm leader is what is required to kill the meeting culture dead, the best example I can think of is John Bloor who has taken Triumph Motorcycles from a basket case to a serious international success........ But it took twenty years to do so.
As you say, it needs a leader to make that happen, another Trenchard, Dowding, or indeed Bloor. The rot permeates the body military, with many tainted by association, others have seen their careers ruined, their health broken, for daring to resist illegal orders. There is now at least enough common sense not to needlessly risk non-military lives (cadets in this case), which is an improvement on the reckless use of a grossly and knowingly unairworthy aircraft to take 25 pax fishing. Yet another tragedy that has never been properly investigated, where evidence was suppressed, where willing witnesses were not called, where deceased crew were made scapegoats for a decade and a half.
Someone has to tackle this situation which has now morphed into the pointless bureaucratic paper shuffling exercise complained of here. Someone...?
Last edited by Chugalug2; 25th Nov 2015 at 09:55.
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Chug
Escalation would be to the Politicians who are supposedly the 'Lords and Masters of the Military'. Since they are equally complicit in the 'paper-trail-arse-covering-not-on-my-watch-mate' process you would get absolutely no-where.
We are no in a society where a decision not to make a decision is seen as a good decision and a good career move by many...........
It's not going to change quickly I'm afraid. We could set up a 'leak enquiry' though as per 'Yes Minister'
Awesome Eh !
Arc
Escalation would be to the Politicians who are supposedly the 'Lords and Masters of the Military'. Since they are equally complicit in the 'paper-trail-arse-covering-not-on-my-watch-mate' process you would get absolutely no-where.
We are no in a society where a decision not to make a decision is seen as a good decision and a good career move by many...........
It's not going to change quickly I'm afraid. We could set up a 'leak enquiry' though as per 'Yes Minister'
Awesome Eh !
Arc
Oh, it has already escalated to SoS level, Arclite. From minister downwards it has been officially declared, in writing, that to issue an order to disregard mandated regulations but to sign them off as complied with is lawful, and that to disobey such an order is an offence.
I have no doubt that you are correct, that we face an impossible situation, but when did that ever stop the Royal Air Force achieving a good result? It faced total extinction post WWI. It faced total annihilation in 1940. On both occasions with good leadership it turned the situation around in its favour. I grant that this time round that the enemy within, its own Star Chamber, is as tough a nut to crack as any, but it can and has to succeed.
An Air Force riddled with unairworthiness carries the seeds of its own destruction. 62 people have died in airworthiness related accidents featured on this forum alone. The RAF lost its entire MAR fleet, and lost numerous other aircraft that had deficiencies common with yet others.
The greatest loss of all though was that of the cadre of trained and experienced engineers with Airworthiness responsibilities. Because their whole raison d'etre was knowledge of the Regulations and the importance of complying with them, the VSO's (almost solely RAF) who carried out this sabotage had no option but to divest themselves of these turbulent priests and replace them with non-engineers who were without training or experience. Within a generation all was lost, knowledge, experience, and even the Regulations themselves. The MAA has been trying to rebuild their house since by re-inventing the wheel and dreaming up new regs which are poor facsimiles of the old ones. The result is the army of apparatchiks that now purport to be Military Air Safety.
Airworthiness is primarily about continuity, about a constant process of technical auditing. Once you break that continuity, especially over a period of decades, you cannot declare any system, any aircraft, to be airworthy. That is the dilemma facing UK Military Aviation today. As I say an impossible situation, so a challenge I'll grant you, but beyond overcoming by the Royal Air Force? I refuse to believe that. We have been saved before by good leadership and we will be saved again by someone who will lead. Someone...?
I have no doubt that you are correct, that we face an impossible situation, but when did that ever stop the Royal Air Force achieving a good result? It faced total extinction post WWI. It faced total annihilation in 1940. On both occasions with good leadership it turned the situation around in its favour. I grant that this time round that the enemy within, its own Star Chamber, is as tough a nut to crack as any, but it can and has to succeed.
An Air Force riddled with unairworthiness carries the seeds of its own destruction. 62 people have died in airworthiness related accidents featured on this forum alone. The RAF lost its entire MAR fleet, and lost numerous other aircraft that had deficiencies common with yet others.
The greatest loss of all though was that of the cadre of trained and experienced engineers with Airworthiness responsibilities. Because their whole raison d'etre was knowledge of the Regulations and the importance of complying with them, the VSO's (almost solely RAF) who carried out this sabotage had no option but to divest themselves of these turbulent priests and replace them with non-engineers who were without training or experience. Within a generation all was lost, knowledge, experience, and even the Regulations themselves. The MAA has been trying to rebuild their house since by re-inventing the wheel and dreaming up new regs which are poor facsimiles of the old ones. The result is the army of apparatchiks that now purport to be Military Air Safety.
Airworthiness is primarily about continuity, about a constant process of technical auditing. Once you break that continuity, especially over a period of decades, you cannot declare any system, any aircraft, to be airworthy. That is the dilemma facing UK Military Aviation today. As I say an impossible situation, so a challenge I'll grant you, but beyond overcoming by the Royal Air Force? I refuse to believe that. We have been saved before by good leadership and we will be saved again by someone who will lead. Someone...?
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Ar Cadets Grounded
Chugalug. I think you and I have been here before, but please give us chapter and verse for "From minister downwards it has been officially declared, in writing, that to issue an order to disregard mandated regulations but to sign them off as complied with is lawful, and that to disobey such an order is an offence.[/B][/I] Regards JP
JP, I am very loathe to encourage you to post yet again a never ending list of questions while you in turn answer none, as was your custom on the Mull thread. As you say we have been around this buoy many times. Having said that the latest "chapter and verse" which you seek was a written ruling from the Cabinet Secretary dated 28th October 2014. That should be provenance enough, so why don't you just seek confirmation from him?
Perhaps though your time might be better spent looking at the act which started the systemic failures, the policy of conscious waste which forced the "savings at the expense of safety" noted by Mr Haddon-Cave.
If you are so minded, you could seek access to letter of promulgation D/DDSS11(RAF)/48/9 dated 30th November 1987, or perhaps go back further to the internal RAF correspondence of June 1987 when the policy of waste was being formulated. In particular, D/DDSS11(RAF) 24/1 dated 8th June 1987, and D/DDSS11(RAF)/24/2 dated 23rd June 1987 (and 20th October 1987). However, you are of course aware of these as they were noted in evidence to Haddon-Cave, and SUBMITTED in evidence to the Mull of Kintyre Review.
Perhaps though your time might be better spent looking at the act which started the systemic failures, the policy of conscious waste which forced the "savings at the expense of safety" noted by Mr Haddon-Cave.
If you are so minded, you could seek access to letter of promulgation D/DDSS11(RAF)/48/9 dated 30th November 1987, or perhaps go back further to the internal RAF correspondence of June 1987 when the policy of waste was being formulated. In particular, D/DDSS11(RAF) 24/1 dated 8th June 1987, and D/DDSS11(RAF)/24/2 dated 23rd June 1987 (and 20th October 1987). However, you are of course aware of these as they were noted in evidence to Haddon-Cave, and SUBMITTED in evidence to the Mull of Kintyre Review.
The November one makes the RAF organisation concerned, and its boss, look idiotic.
BB, forgive me, but I thought that this thread is about the grounding of the VGS fleet due to airworthiness concerns. The cause of those concerns, in not only that fleet but others of the RAF, may seem ancient to you but is very much present in its effects today.
Many of the young people who have been cheated of the thrill of being at the controls for the first time may want to know why, even if you don't. I agree that to them the cause may indeed be ancient, but its effects are being felt by them right now and if as we hope they still join the RAF the effects will go on being felt by them, unless and until Military Airworthiness and Air Accident Investigation be wrested from the MOD and made independent of it and of each other.
Many of the young people who have been cheated of the thrill of being at the controls for the first time may want to know why, even if you don't. I agree that to them the cause may indeed be ancient, but its effects are being felt by them right now and if as we hope they still join the RAF the effects will go on being felt by them, unless and until Military Airworthiness and Air Accident Investigation be wrested from the MOD and made independent of it and of each other.
Last edited by Chugalug2; 25th Nov 2015 at 21:15.
BB:-
Moved on by you, BB? Threads I grant move to and fro, often with loud shrills of "thread drift", but this is the first time I've been accused of thread drift for posting re the OP! How does your recovery work without aircraft anyway?
You may not like what I write, to be honest I'd much prefer to feel not compelled to. There have been threads here re fatal accidents concerning Nimrod, Hercules, Chinook, Tornado, Sea King and the MB Mk10 seat. I think that on every one I, and others like me, have been invited to post elsewhere. This was about their world, so butt out! Yet each of those accidents had two things in common, unairworthiness and lost lives; 14, 10, 29, 2, 7, and 1 respectively. 63 needless and avoidable deaths.
That is why your aircraft are grounded and, before rearranging the deckchairs, you need to take that on board. It is very easy to ground a fleet, but very difficult to get it off the ground again, especially when the problem is systemic rather than purely technical. Just saying...
That's how the thread started, it's moved on to the recovery and the future for the organisation.
You may not like what I write, to be honest I'd much prefer to feel not compelled to. There have been threads here re fatal accidents concerning Nimrod, Hercules, Chinook, Tornado, Sea King and the MB Mk10 seat. I think that on every one I, and others like me, have been invited to post elsewhere. This was about their world, so butt out! Yet each of those accidents had two things in common, unairworthiness and lost lives; 14, 10, 29, 2, 7, and 1 respectively. 63 needless and avoidable deaths.
That is why your aircraft are grounded and, before rearranging the deckchairs, you need to take that on board. It is very easy to ground a fleet, but very difficult to get it off the ground again, especially when the problem is systemic rather than purely technical. Just saying...
I have none, other than to return RAF fleets (including VGS ones) to full airworthiness by the reforms I previously mentioned. What can be done in the interim will fall to the likes of you, I suspect.
I'm just the messenger, so shoot me if you will, but others on thread might be interested in the back story to what has befallen the Air Cadets Organisation. I was one once, and remember the thrill of first solo in a Cadet glider at Christchurch. If I'd been told on my first day that there would be no gliding for me, today or any other, I would want to know why. There are people to blame and it is because they are protected that the problem is not confronted, even by the MAA. Just in case you were interested...
I'm just the messenger, so shoot me if you will, but others on thread might be interested in the back story to what has befallen the Air Cadets Organisation. I was one once, and remember the thrill of first solo in a Cadet glider at Christchurch. If I'd been told on my first day that there would be no gliding for me, today or any other, I would want to know why. There are people to blame and it is because they are protected that the problem is not confronted, even by the MAA. Just in case you were interested...