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Mr Purdey,
it needs to be said until people accept that there is no legal precedent which allows the Reviewing Officers to substitute a properly arrived at verdict with an opinion of their own. Even the MoD Legal Department have been unable to locate a Regulation or Authority which permits such a change. Good to see you back. Kind regards, Brian "Justice has no expiry date" - John Cook |
Olive Oil is yet again substituting "Rank" for experience.
We have already established that Wratten has no "experience" whatsoever on helicopters. Sir John's "experience" is resticted to piston engined helicopters some fifeteen years or more before the crash. John Purdey has stated many times that the reviewing officers came to their decision with the assistance of skilled Staff Officers. What he has never answered is why the AM's (or their Staff), felt it necessary to not only exclude the evidence of the most current Test Pilot, (Sqn Ldr Burke), but also attempt to suppress it. |
dalek,
Careful; Wratten had limited exposure to SH (I flew him in Bosnia, when he was 'economical with the truth' about previous Chinook flying), mostly after the events in 1994 but certainly within the timescale of the continued efforts to blame the crew. Day's experience was much more current than that. He'd commanded an SH unit in NI only a few years before the tragedy. That doesn't mean that his involvement in this sorry, sordid episode in the SH Force's, and the RAF's, history was excusable. If anything, it makes his actions even more incomprehensible. In my opinion. |
Thank you for the correction Thud. I agee with your observation.
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dalek wrote:
<<What he has never answered is why the AM's (or their Staff), felt it necessary to not only exclude the evidence of the most current Test Pilot, (Sqn Ldr Burke), but also attempt to suppress it.>> Well, when Sqn Ldr Burke did give his opinion in one or other of the circuses, he did seem to be giving his opinion based upon a single rotor helicopter when he was commenting upon the large left pedal input (start of slew to left) - whether or not it was his intent to stem any thought of control at that point he must have severely limited the consideration of that possibility. Someone out there tell us all what is done with the yaw pedals (in a tandem rotor a/c!) in a "quick stop" - just the sort of t6hing you may attempt if taken by surprise when immediate power limited as you were coasting in. I challenge Sqn Ldr Burke to describe the above manouevre fully on the open forum - just as redress for his appalling misleading testimony - OK, OK, but even if they were not doing so, the manouevre should not have been dismissed as a possibility by Burke as it was. |
Oh jeez, Walt - I briefly took you out of my 'ignore' list only to realise, with your latest post, just how little you know about the person you defame. I knew "Dr Death" Sqn Ldr Burke from the moment I started as a baby SH pilot in 1978 until the date I flew one of my last Chinook trips in 1998 - a night currency check as QHI on the Chinook OCU (27(R) in those days) on Sqn Ldr Burke. In between I flew several post-maintenance Chinook airtests as his co-pilot. There was no RAF pilot at that time more experienced in operating the Chinook (sometimes not fully serviceable) in the extremes of its flight envelope.
he did seem to be giving his opinion based upon a single rotor helicopter he must have severely limited the consideration of that possibility appalling misleading testimony |
New Look at the evidence
Well it was good to get hold of the Racal report on the RNS252 SuperTANS , big thanks to TUCUMSEH for pointing me in the right direction , it confirms almost everything which I had suggested in my updates # 6155 and # 6181 .....with one exception.........the two mile offset on initialization of the unit was NOT from a
GPS error.... ........which was my first guess , but I think the remainder of my argument on # 6155/6181 is still valid..... What , it is possible that no-one knew at the time (new equipment) , is that the first memory location. (that is waypoint number one) is used to initialise the unit unless another selection is made..... ie...that is the default............and in this case the first 80 locations had been loaded from an external device......referred to as ' Data Transfer Device'......at some unknown time.....?????? . This could have even been the previous day as this data is kept alive by the internal battery..........the locations were NI and so you have to guess it was loaded recently....... ...the next waypoint , entered 'manually' , is labelled as 'H' and ......... #A........may have been used in the sortie on the morning of the fateful trip.......in which case the crew must have become aware of any obvious error on the superTANS..... or #B........was entered purely to test the SuperTANS just before the flight to Scotland...... #C..........but in any case was not used as part of the route to Scotland........ A 'test' or 'simulated' flight to this point whilst stationary would have portrayed a significant offset of around two miles to anyone with navigational ability ... The extra waypoints needed for the trip to Scotland were entered manually into the next available locations.................. So the whole system was STILL initialised with a two mile error ....all that changes is where the error came from....... ............. So what do you do with a 'dodgy' SuperTANS ??? ......... Re-initialise it ????.....wastes some time...... Re-enter the waypoints to correct things??????.....again wastes time and is risky........ Go with it as-is????........the intended track from waypoints 'B' through 'D' are in roughly the same alignment as the 'offset' error is , and so it would cause more of a distance to run problem than a port or starboard heading problem to them , and that part of the journey should be reasonable VFR.... At waypoint 'A' they should be at sea..... So they could have lifted off reasonably confident that they were being guided to a safe waypoint 'A' some distance offshore of the light house..... A crosscheck of the two independant sources , GPS and Doppler , halfway across open sea would show little difference , barely the width of the needle on the attitude display....... Approaching the cloud covered Mull they may have thought that the cloud cover seemed to extend a long way out to sea..????.......not realising they were too far East .... ..and then how do you know how bad the visibility along the edge of a cloud bank is , till you take a look..??.. It would surely take anyone ten seconds in cloud to decide whether the flight conditions were bad enough to require some form of diverson..... But they could have hit the ground in those ten seconds , lost directional control when things broke loose......and then ended up hitting again ...the main impact up near the road to the lighthouse ........ If the RNS252 had been an INS unit or purely a Doppler fed unit , this two mile 'offset' error would remain during the flight......subject to the normal errors , drift etc.and in fact the Doppler position had changed quite a lot during the fated journey , drifting closer to the true Lat. and Long......... The GPS source started off with the same two mile 'offset' , but I think only Racal can tell us if , under which settings , and how long it might take ...for the SuperTANS to correct itself with the true location from the GPS signal and eliminate this two mile error......... In the event it had PASSED the correct and true Lat. and Long. and gone some way out the ' other side ' and this is what guided the A/C into the Mull ...... ( It is worth noting here that a line drawn between the true location and that reported by the GPS at the crash site reflects an angle of 55 degrees to the equator , which is the same angle as the orbit of the GPS satellites........no big suprise..........suggesting timing errors...) So sadly , it seems convincing to me that they were pressured into using an A/C with which they were not totally confident , or completely familiar , and the choice of a switch setting between GPS and Doppler led to the crash...... I have seen no testimony from anyone else who flew ZD576 , it must have been test flown after shipping from Boeing ???? , and there was the ferry flight to NI ..??????...... Was there a checklist for initializing the SuperTANS.......????......surely that is not still classified?? Or was it one of the blank pages at that time....to be filled in at a later date....????????.. I find it strange that Racal got away with providing written evidence to the enquiry instead of being called to explain and interpret the data collected as I have tried to do...?????..... |
Thud
So why did he state what he did on that occassion? Sounds like you are familiar enough with the machines to put the record straight - are you going to describe how the yaw pedals may be moved while initiating a quick stop? Thought not.:hmm: You should revise SL Burke's testimony before you call my description of it stupid - he really was describing the effect of yaw on a single rotor job. Despite all the high regard you lot hold for him, he either screwed up or deliberately distracted that particular inquiry from the possibility that they still had control at that point. Before you chip in Brian, I do realise that he qualified what he said in "written notes" or whatever it was called, sort of correcting a bit, but the damage was done, that inquiry was wasted. Keep waffling on all - you have been playing right into the hands of the establishment. |
Brian et al, I apologise for biting. I should've read Wholigan's thread more closely.
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Robin,
It is over thirteen years since I used TANS and around seven since I last used a precision Navaid. (HINS) It is my recollection that these aids if uncorrected would initialise to shutdown position. With a serviceable kit this would lead to no errors, unless the aircraft had been towed a considerable distance between sorties. Every crew I have ever known, would have entered precise co-ordinates on kit start up. These would have been taken very accurately from surveyed pan position or a very accurate IN or landing chart. Waypoint one is a navigation turning point. You can enter it as North or South Pole without having any effect on kit accuracy. |
Dalek,
It's also been a while for me and whilst I was Puma crewman I recall we also initialised the kit in the manner you describe. We would then enter all the waypoints into the kit and then cross check the headings and distances between each leg displayed on the kit with the info we had put onto any maps or charts we were using. |
New Look........
dalek and Seldomffp......
that is exactly my point........it sounds wrong....?!?!?!?!..... Racal say they would expect to see the home base Lat. and Long. in the first waypoint location........that way the unit would initialize itself correctly , and bring you back there after a sortie......... But what Racal found was the first 80 waypoints had been loaded in one go from a handheld device.....???... The first waypoint related to a field some two miles from the airfield...????..this was used for initialisation... subsequently it appears that waypoints named H,A,B,C and D were manually entered from the keypad into locations 81 thru' 85 ...... A route was manually entered to include waypoints A,B,C,D.... I do not see how that would work correctly.???..unless you re-initialized the unit at one of the existing waypoints when you reached that waypoint....... also from Racal........you will only get a warning if the GPS and Doppler locations are more than 5 miles apart....??? rgds.... |
Robin,
"Racal say they would expect to see Lat and Long of departure airfield as first waypoint." Not always true or essential. An Example: If I wish to depart my home airfield via a light airfield 2 miles west of my departure point then fly to a headland 60nms north, I can set waypoint 1 as the light airfield and waypoint 2 as the headland. I set up the kit in Along / Across track mode. It will display Track 360 DTG 60.00 2.00R. I get airborne fly west until the across track aproaches 0.5R then turn onto north. In my time and at the time of this flight, this was a fairly common technique. Did the crew do this? No idea. Neither does anyone else. You never initialise a precision navaid to a waypoint. You do it by manual entry of PP (Present Position) |
Robin, not saying it's the case but if the first 80 waypoints were already used it could be that they were all of the various HLS's within the province.
I seem to remember, and again not saying it's the case, that Aldergrove had a few "points" of interest within the zone boundry so maybe WP 1 was one of those and was already pre loaded? |
Racal say they would expect to see Lat and Long of departure airfield as first waypoint." Not always true or essential. An Example: If I wish to depart my home airfield via a light airfield 2 miles west of my departure point then fly to a headland 60nms north, I can set waypoint 1 as the light airfield and waypoint 2 as the headland. I set up the kit in Along / Across track mode. It will display Track 360 DTG 60.00 2.00R. I get airborne fly west until the across track aproaches 0.5R then turn onto north. In my time and at the time of this flight, this was a fairly common technique. Did the crew do this? No idea. Neither does anyone else. You never initialise a precision navaid to a waypoint. You do it by manual entry of PP (Present Position) |
Guys
We may never know what actually took place that day. Plainly there is a degree of doubt. That doubt will always linger. But....There is a true version of events that day. Never doubt it. If the pilots actually CFITd the a/c. They are guilty of GN. Most pilots seem to think they probably did. So if you get the GN charge overturned then YOU will actually be guilty of perpetrating a miscarriage of justice, not the RAF. On the other hand, if the a/c done a real nasty on them, hey- you're correct. Lawyers agree with you. Let them off with the GN! Just to remind people what they are actually campaigning for. |
Rubbish written about the RNS 252 again. When you switched it on it had 2 'plots': GPS and DR (doppler and air data). As long as you were in the same county as when it was last switched off, the GPS told YOU were you were a lot more accurate than you could tell it!! A quick couple of buttons press then brought the DR 'in-line' with the boss. When you initialised, you did put you present position in, but NOT as a waypoint in your route. Most of the time we didn't even use the route mode. What I am saying is that you didn't have to be at a waypoint to update the two plots. However, if the GPS was U/S, it was much easier to tell the DR plot where it was by overflying a waypoint and pressing fix. You could still faff and do an offset fix from a navigation beacon. By far the best system overland was to use a map..........
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BarbiesB is right. What we can read from the damaged TANS gives us a useful insight into what "may" have happened but cannot tell us what did.
If you remember the Reviewing Officers attempted at the HOL enquiry to justify their decision, based partly on a TANS reconstruction. A reconstruction admitted by Boeing to show what "may" have happened. TANS was not an ADR and was never designed to be one. It cannot be used to either clear or condemn the crew. |
If the pilots actually CFITd the a/c. They are guilty of GN. Most pilots seem to think they probably did. Even if the aircraft was controllable when it hit the ground, there may well other factors which would contradict the 'Gross Negligence' verdict imposed by W&D over the findings of the BOI (and all other enquiries since then). The operative word in the above sentence is 'may'. Nobody will ever know the full sequence of events due to the lack of any Flight Recorder or CVR, therefore W&D's 'finding' is manifestly unjust and must be overturned. The lamentable lack of process in the release to service is a different campaign, which for the good of the service I hope will take place in due course. |
If the pilots actually CFITd the a/c. They are guilty of GN. Most pilots seem to think they probably did. CFIT can certainly be classified as pilot error (but not always) and however my opinion is that they buggered it up.... they made bad errors and bad judgements but that doesn't mean that they are guilty of GN |
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