MT big brother AKA Trimble
 

Well according to my Satnav and the speedo in the car I always drive to the speed limits. Image my shock and surprise the other day when I was told I had been doing 45 in a 30. This anonymous machine had belched out some data telling me I was a dangerous driver. Ta very much.
I believe it's an American GPS system that has been fitted to MT cars. Must run off a different GPS to my satnav.
Am I the only victim of BB.

What machine told you you were doing "doing 45 in a 30" ?

And if you have a GPS to prove it otherwise, tell them.

MT big brother AKA Trimble
 

I must have got the wrong end of the stick. I thought the idea of the system was to see how many red and orange lights you could get on a single journey. I also thought the subsequent letter to my Boss from the MT section was a good thing too especially since he received one on the same day (top cover!).
It's a bit of a crap system TBH. If you drive round a roundabout too quickly or take too long with a gear change you get pinged. Still it is an easy way to get out of being duty driver!
BV

Don't worry ... It'll all be sorted before the kit get's finally fitted to the F-35 :uhoh:

http://i1004.photobucket.com/albums/...ps616d82fa.jpg

MT ARGHHHHHH
 

Amazing, given that RAF MT should have been abolished years ago, I had an e-mail telling me I'd done 50 in a 40 zone when actually I'd done 90 in a 70 zone. Always a red light around roundabouts (Newtons Laws anyone), they won't look after the vehicles, won't drive me and moan when I drive myself!! Flash Flash
Rant over

Not sure what this has to do with millitary aviation but I might have misunderstood (correction - I did not understand) the original post. Your GPS and speedo tell you that you stick to the speed limit but then tell you that you were speeding? Who or what is Trimble?

Trimble GPS Fleet Management

It's a bit of a shame you can't take one of these Trimble things on a spot of low level SCT and put some proper data on it ... now that letter to the Boss would be worth framing :}

Can't see the "traffic lights" any more. My new staff car has its Trimble hidden somewhere in the bowels of the vehicle (at least - that's what they tell me ........).

Much less fun - roundabouts and wiggly country lanes were always good sport - or even a swift motorway lane change. :E

MT tell me the local record is 106 mph - now that is very silly! (assuming it wasn't down a runway!)

Edited to add aviation content:

Reminds me of an aged pilot telling me his first jet (Meatbox or Vampire??) had accelerometers retro-fitted before they had published G limits.

Of course, the game was on..........:E

Teeters :D:D:D:D

Why would you not make the lights come on and if its a good trip you should always get an e mail from MT telling you how well you did.

MT big brother? Some years ago, SROs published a diatribe from the MT Section informing drivers that it was their personal responsibility to check that the wheelnuts were tightened to the correct torque before driving any service vehicle.

The next day one of my colleagues had to use a service car and went to sign it out. He asked the duty MT NCO for a torque wrench and information on the correct wheelnut torques so he could check the car, iaw with SROs.

The answer? "Torque wrench, Sir? I have no idea what you are talking about....we don't have any torque wrenches....why would you want to do that?"

You have data logging onboard? where is the fun in that? must have a fuse somewhere or can you not just disconnect the battery for say 10 mins. If it hasn't a back up that should clear it ;)

I suppose taking the likes of an RAF Sherpa around the remaining banked track at Brooklands with everyone in the back piled over to one side to help with C of G issues is frowned upon these days. :O

Thank God the only flashing light I get in my car is the one telling me I have exceeded the Quatro systems grip limits, and we are entering slippy slidie territory ;)

Ah. The same mistake of thinking that 'ground safety' has nothing to do with 'flight safety'.
Given the cost to the MoD (financial, lives, reputation etc), something had to be done. Training and licensing evidently did not work. It appears to be a reasonable idea that was not well implemented. Other similar schemes across many areas (inc Heathrow) have had great success.

Mr C H, I take your point, but I have to ask, have we had a particularly high accident rate in the Forces? Any figures?

I wonder if things changed significantly when we stopped having professional drivers.

http://www.dasa.mod.uk/publications/...ember_2012.pdf

Quite hard for anyone responsible for the safety of their people to ignore the statistics of higher risk in that report.
I can't find any figures for the financial cost. With the MoD being 'self-insuring' for all road vehicles, the cost to defence per accident is very large as they pay for everything including compensation to other parties. I have seen a few presentations by the MoD team responsible for this in the past and 'cost per crash' is a big enough number to warrant some effort to reduce.

The MT Trade is still proud of being professional at operating vehicles.

CH, thanks for the stats. Rather shocking, I see what you mean.

Courtney

Very sad figures.
 

Yes very sad that, highest loss rate after Hostile action is Land Transport Accident according to the link there, in recent years.
I used to tell all my lads if they were late, adrift for work never to speed, ever. Rather see them all in eventually.....safe. I couldn't care a less if they were late, if I'm truthful.
Now approaching the usual station/ sections usual anti-drink driving period now I suppose...?
Smashed up car outside the main gates with big signs on it saying " Don't do this" or words to the same......do they still do that?

A couple of years ago, 3 of us were returning from a det up north and pushing to get home by a reasonable time. Called MT to inform them we would be later than expected and that we would sign the vehicle in the following morning. They asked who was driving, thought nothing of it and gave them the correct answer, turns out we were doing 80+ and they could see it on the tracker!

One young student was logged driving an MT vehicle, his average speed was 90+, he was banned from driving MT and had to give a brief on the MT tracking system at the next wing brief!

I know this will sound geeky, but.......whilst I was still in I thought I would have some fun with the MT role office since they introduced this system without consulting other functional areas as they were supposed to. So I asked for the safety case that showed that the commercially available GSM (mobile phone) based technology met prescribed safety protocols for electrical and transmitting equipment in explosive areas. When they couldn't, I pointed out that it is illegal under UK law to use a mobile phone at a petrol station, against Mil safety rules to do so in an explosive atmosphere area (flight line) and against explosive regs to do so in an ESA or indeed to have non-safe electrical items. The arm and CIS role offices then got very involved, especially when I got OC Eng to threaten having all the equipment removed on explosive safety grounds.......upshot was all the armourer vehicles and those allocated to the flying squadrons were trimble free at a secret AD base in Lincolnshire. I've been gone from the base/Service for 12months+ so don't know if its still the case, but would like to think that my sucessor maintained the same stance.

I'm all for improving safety, but if something is worth doing - do it properly otherwise it becomes a false 'safety blanket' or as with trimble, mis-used.

Drives
 

Do I assume we are talking aboutt he DRIVES system. (Three little lights on the dash)? we were all told this was not being recorded and was advisory. Then.... got called into see the surrogate MTO at secret RAF base Nr Huntingdon. Been doing 106 mph down the M5 on way to ABW. Apparently the record was held by a Gp Capt. I agreed and did modify my behaviour. When I was shown the print outs it did not have location just time.

Spent the early days experimenting to find out what the parameters were. You could cruise at 80 true but over that the lights flashed. if you did not back off it stayed on. The system was also equipped with accelerometers. so braking sharp to avoid a duck at 20mph also kept the red light on for 5 mins.

A bit of wheelspin pulling out of a damp T-junction resulted in the red 'good skills' light coming on for about the same amount of time.

Isn't this type of in car monitoring working its way into the private motoring. Some insurance companies already have an app you can run on your mobile - data is measured by the phones accelerometer and gps to present a profile of your driving style. Theory being if you are a safe driver it could lower your premiums. I think it wont be long until the insurance companies mandate the fitting of black box recorders - useful for assessing general risk and accident situations. Must admit I think there's already too much technology in cars. If you ever get the opportunity to drive a 1960 car then do it so much fun.

As this new and helpful feature arrived after I left, may I ask what exactly happens when one causes a red light? Is it like and ASBO that "customers" can display proudly on the office wall or are there actually sancions involved.

I think I know what my reatio to this would be.

Yes, 3 strikes and you loose your flying pay.
4 and you pay back FRI :E

No I think they just bring it to your attention so you can self moderate. Maybee they need to say "do it again and you will be taken off the deployment list":p

Or maybe, Tom, they take away your MT Diver's Permit so that you have to be given an MT driver to to take you wherever you need to go. Tough love, eh? :{

Two parts to that:

Firstly. You don't become another accident statistic because you can't be trusted to drive to the safe and legal limits.

Secondly. MT gets overloaded and starts being unable to meet the tasks. It gets so bad that some cocky Exec raises it in front of OC Eng or the Staish to try and score cheap points over OC Logs. MTO is summoned to Staishes office and there produces detailed stats of all station personnel who have had their MT license revoked and why. Staish knows what Duty of Care means and subsequently tells his Execs that the problem is theirs for not gripping their people and he backs the actions of the MTO.
In the end, nobody wins, some people will never learn a lesson, but less people are dead or injured.

CH, sorry I didn't make it clear, but I wasn't being serious, I was joking with Tom. Your points are quite right, though.

Why?



.

CM,

Where I work, there is roughly a 20% tolerance margin. If you are outside of this, then a snotagram follows with the details through the Stn Cdr to your line manager. I think, if 3 of these are received, you are banned from MT for 3 months and may well lose your car pass too. Very serious breaches such as the one above, or doing 70mph outside a school 20mph zone are treated more sternly.

Good answer, PA, thank you. I guess that seems pretty reasonable on balance.

Hey, that could be a new box on the good old annual appraisal form. I must suggest it to the powers that aren't! :E

Surely the point of installing a costly system like this is to publicise it to modify driving behaviour? But as its existence comes as a surprise to many of those being monitored it seems in fact to be being used as a weaselly gotcha.

BEags,
Cos if you were driving more than 12 hrs they made you stop over!!

No the truth is that I was working on a UOR and had to get some 2* signatures on the RTS before they went home.

I became a supporter of the system to some extent. As soon as I knew they were interrogating the system I slowed down. so it did have the desired effect.

Now I do think they should have publicised the fact rather than let us find out by defaulting.

Reference:

"....You don't become another accident statistic because you can't be trusted to drive to the safe and legal limits...."

While not condoning illegal driving, I should point out (hopefully an obvious point) that it is perfectly possible to become an accident statistic without personally doing anything wrong/illegal/unsafe - as was my own case when someone crossed the center of the road and hit my vehicle head on, they were only 2.5 times over the legal alcohol limit for driving.

Ultimately, the only way to ensure you never become a road accident statistic is to never go anywhere near a road.

If the RAF (MOD?) is serious about improving road safety then a comprehensive, long term and sustained campaign is required, akin to that for flight safety, not just the installation of technology in MT vehicles. After all, if RAF personnel are driving irresponsibly they are just as likely to have an accident/injury/fatality in their own vehicle. So is the current approach really about duty of care, or more about reducing the MOD bill for accidents? It's alright for you to have an accident in your own car, but not an MOD one...

It's also possible to exceed those (purely arbitrary) limits by, amongst other things, braking suddenly to avoid some numbnuts who suddenly walks, or swerves their bicycle, into your path.

If one treats people like idiots expect to get a healthy dose of scorn in return.

And as for the 'tick test' to allow one to drive in a foreign country... probably deserves a thread to itself.

Ahhh ... I spy a cunning plan afoot here Gentlemen :suspect:

If you add all this technology together ... I reckon there's a plan by the Airships to deploy all the future Air Traffic Control Officers, that Shawbury keeps turning out, as RAF MT Fleet Controllers :}

See what can be done ...

http://i1004.photobucket.com/albums/...ps051728aa.jpg

Image Credit : Eric Fischer, Mapbox

Perhaps you might even get a "Precision Approach" if the M1 gets clamped by fog :eek:

The pilot can't have known that map would be created, else the they would have gone to greater lengths to draw a c0ck 'n' balls.

WW :D:D:D:D

WW, Some years ago I was told such a story by a particular perpetrator, by then a Group Captain and my Station Commander. As a young pilot he was a Valley QFI tasked to carry out the weather check, in his Hunter. He drew a huge "wedding tackle" in persistent con-trails, which was visible for many miles against a bright blue sky.

The station received a number of complaints and eventually launched a four-ship formation to cross it out!

Done to death. Regular training, awareness, courses, reminders. However, people believe it won't happen to them and switch off. The likes of Flight Safety also take the higher priority and everything else becomes background noise. The commute is something stn MT and local plod will regularly cooperate over in an attempt to improve things for all. Playing devil's advocate here, but if you have been trained and passed a test to drive your own car why should you think the RAF should accept responsibility for your actions in your own time?

Quite right. But the MoD can do nothing to influence those other drivers. They can do more to ensure that the people they have a Duty of Care for are driving safe and legal vehicles in a safe and legal manner. I said this was a reasonable idea poorly executed. I'm sure the near misses in aircraft would be far less if there were no other aircraft up there.