Military Risk
 

Just a different point of view, the a/c takes off from xxxx and ploughs into the centre o, Insert city/ town. (No I don't want this to happen)
Who is responsible and will they stand up and stick their chest out and admit ANY failures? Or will they hide?

HH:-
The 'system' that you refer to is Hammond who has the power to override the MAA, which says that it is grateful that he has done so. So that's all right then, isn't it? Isn't it?

Well, many if not all the current rules were put in place by the MAA which really had little choice as the last lot were shredded by Pol Pot, sorry RAF VSO's. However, I guess you mean the rules under which airworthiness used to be provided when... well, when airworthiness used to be provided.

So you have a choice, establish an independent MAA and MAAIB who will then have the unenviable and prolonged task of regaining that past system, or continue with the present farce whereby the MAA is seen to be a toothless tiger under the malevolent control of the MOD. If that is the case its demise cannot be far off in yet another exciting new round of freshly painted signage.

The downside is of course continuing avoidable airworthiness related accidents and entirely needless deaths, but you're up for that aren't you, Tourist and Roland?

Chugalug

Yes, I am up for avoidable deaths in the interests of military capability if the only way to stop them is to neuter our forces.


A bit like the way we accept avoidable road deaths in their thousands in the interests of having a country that keeps operating.
We could reduce road deaths by mandating a 5 Mph speed limit throughout the country and cars surrounded in 20ft of foam, but nobody wants it despite it being an easy to implement fix. I wonder why?

Tourist, there is absolutely no question that your position on this will be fulfilled. RJ simply joins all the other fleets that are known to be unairworthy, suspected of being unairworthy, or at least cannot be assumed to be airworthy. That is the reality of present day UK Military Aviation.

So we are not in conflict over that. My point is that for the future of UK Military Aviation we should agree upon taking the necessary steps of changing all that and slowly (and like all things that have been broken in an instance, it will be a long and slow process of repair) begin to reattain the process of airworthiness provision that no longer exists.

RJ proves, if nothing else, the irrelevance that is the present MAA. It has known that since inception RJ could never be issued with an RTS iaw the regulations. That merely resulted in the farce at Waddington until the SoS did what everyone expected him to do, and now one has been issued. Result! Well hardly, because as the DG MAA reminds us, it still doesn't accord with the regs and almost certainly never will.

Either we get to grips with this scandal and start the process of reverse by making the MAA and the MAAIB independent of the MOD and of each other, or we scrap them and leave the whole rotten mess in the maws of the MOD which created it anyway.

The MAA and MAAIB are worse than useless because they create an aura of respectability to a process driven by ignorance, incompetence, and gross negligence. If they hang around as is they will simply be kept busy overseeing a steadily increased airworthiness related accident rate that they were supposed to prevent. An expensive and pointless exercise in sheer waste.

I'm going to reluctantly dip a toe in here....

I suspect the issue here is not one of eliminating all risk, but rather one of understanding the likely risks and their likely occurrence relative to how the aircraft is operated.

No-one is saying the aircraft is inherently unsafe - the millions of flying hours in USAF service suggests otherwise. However, that is NOT the same as understanding the risk. Nor are they suggesting that the three UK frames are somehow inferior - they're not AMARC regenerations, but rather direct KC135R conversions.

The issue for RJ appears to be that either Design disclosure for the original frame design is incomplete or inaccessible, or that the staff in MAA are either not competent or have not been sufficiently resourced to do the design assessment in time to meet the programme RTS. It's all coloured by the aftermath of H-C and people's experience / perception of the way the system appears to have been broken.

Tourist is entirely right in the idea that you cannot remove all risk from flying (especially military flying). However by the same token, a competent organisation ought to be able to understand the risks it is taking and certainly not attempt to suppress / subvert that process.

The first part of that last sentence requires a well-staffed competent engineering organisation and the last part indicates that at least some of the engineering oversight function (potentially the MAAIB) ought to be independent from the operator.

Agreed Nab, but Regulation is also an oversight function, leading to enforcement when required. If that simple process had continued unhindered in the late 80's, instead of have being utterly subverted, then this and other airworthiness threads here might never have been needed.

Who did the subversion? The operator, aka the MOD, aka certain known VSO's. Their actions have been reported to Parliamentary Committees, MPs, Ministers, SOS's, Judicial Reviews, the media, and the police (both civil and military). The result is that they remain unmolested and unchallenged. Is the moral to draw from this that nothing can be done? Not in my book, on the contrary it suggests that plenty must be done, in order to avoid any further subversion.

Just as the MAAIB must be independent so must the MAA, and both must be manned by professionals that place their jobs above their careers. That means civilian DGs heading up both, and service personnel who are seconded so that their CoC is through those DGs and not the Services.

The MAAIB is an equally important check in such a system, but only kicks in when the system has already failed. Rather than seek merely to avoid further failures, far better to avoid them in the first place, especially when the failure infects a whole fleet, or many fleets. That is why both the MAA and MAAIB should be independent of each other as well as of the MOD.

You are right though, the key is in trained and experienced engineers in both organisations. The very people who were got rid of by RAF VSO's.

The point of all this is to maintain operational capability and not have it frittered away by avoidable accidents and compromised fleets, both of which exist now.

Gentleones, is it possible that the MAA has some very competent engineers and operators that have been following the extant rules diligently? Those rules that are possibly designed for the ideal situation of new aircraft procurement? And that, encountering a situation not of their making, are finding a pragmatic solution that, as they are so experianced and competent, they understand the risks all to well and can come to a sound judgement?? Or, as Tuc has already said he would use his engineering judgment to use outdated CA instructions over current regs, are the only competent people long out of service of the MOD and those left are so inferior? Not capable of reasoned, risk based, decisions based on the full available evidence which those inhabiting the hallowed grounds of pprune are not privy to! If this is the case, then it matters not one iota if the "devils pack" of the MAA & MilAAIB are totally independent of MOD, as cloning is not yet feasible for humans, the only competent ones can not be reproduced at a working age but with all that hard earned experiance in place, so there would be no SQEP available to man the desks.

Nice piece DBP.

"...engineering judgment to use outdated CA instructions over current regs..."

All aircraft, from the Wright's Flyer to today's F-35, have been built to "a specification".

Even today all aircraft are mainly held to their original specification (as that's the designed they were built to meet) and operators and authorities are supposed to have access to that spec when accepting new and second-hand aircraft - to compare it against its designed origins and current modified status.

Used aircraft are 'normally' assessed against their original spec or changed design spec. In former days New regulations were not normally used to assess an old aircraft and are not 'normally' retrospectively applied except for new modifications. The aircraft should meet its original or (certified) modified specifications.

Some aircraft have been modified to conduct new roles (Sentry, Sentinel, Shadow, Voyager etc.) and have developed new profiles and parameters in which they operate. (I'm not sure about Sentry here, but that not my point)

NORMALLY, development of changes such as those would be through defined and legal practices in design and production followed by thorough testing and retesting to confirm, define or rectify performance limitations.

"What if", years ago, some military/contractor establishments did not conduct said practices and just bolted/soldered some stuff together - that happened to work - and just left it at that? ...And then happened to sell some of that stuff years later?

How could anyone justify "using engineering judgement" without any supporting documentation or evidence?

(I am not saying that anyone has done this - it's just "What if?")

Today's aircraft are not built to a Specification they are built to a contract. OK they start with a specification, but after all the PTs "we can't afford that" and the manufacturers "we don't want (can't) build that" and "our suppliers can only gives this" you end up with a contract for an aircraft that doesn't do what the customer wanted and doesn't meet 00-970 let alone Mil Specs. This is because it was built as a 'Civil Certified' design as that is seen as a quicker / cheaper route by the PT and the manufacturer who hasn't designed and built a military aircraft because they understand FAR 25 better than any Def Stan or Mil Specs.

It was doing Circuits & Bumps last week when I drove past Waddo.

Let's be clear, this discussion is not about those who currently work, and no doubt work hard, for the MAA and MAAIB, but about the MAA and MAAIB themselves. The last 'A' in MAA stands for authority, ie the buck stops with them. But it doesn't does it? A knowingly unairworthy aircraft is introduced to the military air register over their heads because it does not accord with their rules. So, as has been asked before, what is the point of the MAA?

A military aircraft escape system is found by the MAAIB to be unairworthy, having never had a Safety Case made for it. It kills a pilot because it is unairworthy, but the MAA responsible for its airworthiness congratulates it on its investigation instead of 'fessing up to its own failure. What is the point of it?

The future of military airworthiness lies with those who man the MAA and MAAIB (other than those within their ranks who have been involved in subversion and cover up in the past). They cannot begin to achieve their purpose until the buck really does stop with them, instead of with those who pull their strings and remain unchallenged.

Aviation doesn't give a damn about good intentions. It simply tries to kill, and often succeeds unless prevented. That is the purpose of the MAA and MAAIB. Time they had the authority to do so. Time they were made independent of the MOD and of each other.

Self Regulation Doesn't Work and in Aviation It Kills!

Deskboundphixer

The reason I'd use the perfectly good instructions and procedures I was brought up on is this. I wouldn't trust the MoD/MAA to come up with anything better.

I recommend everyone read the MAA's document MMA02 "Master Glossary".

There are an alarming number of "intentional blanks". Take the first one, in alphabetical order - "Acceptable Deferred Faults". OK, there are a few here who don't give a toss about such things, but most do. Is everyone content the "Authority" can't offer an authoritative definition? Does that mean training on the subject is deferred as well?

What about Post Design Services? There is a definition, but it is wrong. The Chief of Defence Procurement's Instructions (CDPIs), which were meant to replace Controller Aircraft Instructions, made exactly the same mistake in 1993; which is why we reverted back to using CAIs even after they were withdrawn. Like I'd still do today.

The proper definition? "Maintain the Build Standard". Simple. Says it all. Why is it important? Because the Safety Case is based on a maintained Build Standard, and the RTS provides a release against a defined Build Standard with a valid Safety Case.

Relevance to Rivet Joint? The Build Standard has not been maintained, and cannot be resurrected or stabilised.

Programme Management 001 - Stabilise your Build Standard otherwise you cannot possibly satisfy mandated Configuration Milestones. See Rivet Joint.

If the MAA get it wrong, who can blame those who are wrongly taught, never appreciating just how important the subject is. That, however, does not absolve those who WERE taught correctly but knowingly suborned the regulations and condoned cancellation of contracts that were meant to maintain Safety Cases. Example: Nimrod. Remember, that's why we need Rivet Joint.


And then add this to Wg Cdr Spry's defintion of "Functional Safety", which is also dangerously wrong. There is a long way to go, and the MAA is not the answer.

That'll do it good.

DBP:-
You need to see the woods for the trees with respect, DBP. The CA Instructions were not outdated, they worked but were arbitrarily scrapped in favour of new CDPIs which were simply wrong, as tuc explains.

That is why he had to continue using CAIs despite them being scrapped. That is why there were now no working mandated regulations to abide by. That is why build standards could no longer be maintained. That is why Safety Cases stopped working. That is why Nimrod happened, that is why the Mk10 seat killed, all because the CAIs were withdrawn and not reintroduced.

That is why there are such large gaps in the MAA Glossary. That is why there are such large gaps in its corporate knowledge. That is why airworthiness related accidents continue to happen and to kill. That is why reform is so urgent. That is why the independence of the MAA must be the starting point of that process.

Self Regulation Doesn't Work and in Aviation It Kills!

Chug, the only thing I'd add is that in the same year (1993) the RAF Chief Engineer/AMSO made yet another 28% cut to the necessary funding and in June that year finally gave up any presence at maintaining Build Standards. Noting the same contract (obviously) maintains the Safety Case and that he'd been formally notified of the inevitable outcome.

The greatest confidence check a programme manager can have is achieving Transfer to PDS. It is money in the bank, akin to a pilot's final walk round and systems checks. Today, if PDS is contracted against the MAA definition, then about 95% of the work covered under the 17 core components (where are they now articulated?!) won't be done; culminating in an invalid Safety Case. As you say - Nimrod, Red Arrows (no Safety Case!), Tornado, Chinook, C130............Rivet Joint.

Not only do the MAA refuse to acknowledge this common denominator in all these accidents and procurement failures, they also condone the long time teaching that it is a waste. Why? Simple, there are VSOs to protect and the MAA forms part of the same club. As you also point out, instead of probing causes and trends their announcements are designed to divert attention from flagrant breaches of law, praising those who have failed while staying silent as those who have succeeded (and DE&S has many such) are vilified. An unhealthy (in fact, deadly) trait.

The USAF has released an image showing a RAF RC-135W (ZZ664) receiving fuel on 26 June from a Boeing KC-135 from its 100th Air Refuelling Wing, based at RAF Mildenhall in Suffolk.

http://www.flightglobal.com/assets/g...x?itemid=56350
Image Credit : USAF, FlightGlobal

More here ...

FlightGlobal : RAF Rivet Joint AAR

nice - can one of the ex-RAF tankies say which AAR area it is? ;) The islands in the background look W.Scotland to me?
Edit - looking again maybe not islands? Possibly a river estuary?

Looks like the Humber at low tide with Cleethorpes/Grimsby on the left shore and Spurn Point is under the wing. I puzzled over the little island in the estuary but I reckon it is low tide?

It's a shame that the RAF can no longer refuel its own assets......

And no, onceapilot, your beloved TriShaw couldn't refuel it either!

Surely it'd make sense for, say, 3 Voyagers to be boom-equipped?