Chinook - Mull of Kintyre
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Chinook - Mull of Kintyre
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Check out this months Pilot magazine. http://www.pilotweb.co.uk/
I don't think you can access the article on the web but it will give you something to read in Smiths when you pop in to pick up her Cosmo.
I don't think you can access the article on the web but it will give you something to read in Smiths when you pop in to pick up her Cosmo.
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So PNVS, you believe that a 150 kt cruise is normal in a Chinook? and that in the event of a run up, the vibration which would undoubtedly follow with the NR sitting above 100%, combined with an outrageous amount of lever to try and contain the NR would not preclude the reading of the instruments.......Bollox! The fadec at that time was not serviceable. We were told to fly on regardless that the TPs had thrown the towel in at Boscombe. Whilst I agree that run ups are not 'normal' let me say that when we got fadec it was supposed to be perfect with continual monitoring to prevent overtemps and the like, well how many overtemps have we had? DOZENS! I personally have had one run up during start and several attempts at overtemp. The issue of wx and icing clearance is a red herring. OK they flew into a cloud covered hill, but if you had any experience of SH ops you would know that the legal wx limits are quite low and that all SH crews are able to operate in ****e wx, especially guys from their flt. Nobody knows exactly what happened on that day, and for that reason we should not have blamed the crew! We may speculate but we will never really know.
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Seems to me all this talk of FADEC is a red herring. Clearly a lot of people have an axe to grind over various technical aspects of the new machine.
The facts are clear. The crew were grubbing just below cloudbase in filthy wx when they should have been at FL100 or home in the bar. The wreckage was just a few tens of feet above the cloudbase, exactly where youd expect to find it in the event of a sudden pull-up at the last second. I recall the report said it was in a somewhat nose-up attitude at impact. This all points to CFIT. I simply cannot imagine how engine problems could have caused this crash, short of distracting both pilots from their lookout. The sad conclusion is that the drivers werent looking where they were going.
Now why they were not IFR is a different matter, I dont know the icing situation at the time, perhaps that was the reason. If so why did they accept the trip, "company pressure"? Is pleading safety frowned on on the RAF? Was the ILS/radar at destination u/s? Why didnt the service put them in a Herc instead. Although rated for such conditions just how much experience did they actually have in real grubbing? I doubt very much. Terribly sad, and a great loss to so many.
Iam sure this post will offend someone, for which I apologise in advance, but I feel too little attention has been payed to the commonsense aspect of this event.
The facts are clear. The crew were grubbing just below cloudbase in filthy wx when they should have been at FL100 or home in the bar. The wreckage was just a few tens of feet above the cloudbase, exactly where youd expect to find it in the event of a sudden pull-up at the last second. I recall the report said it was in a somewhat nose-up attitude at impact. This all points to CFIT. I simply cannot imagine how engine problems could have caused this crash, short of distracting both pilots from their lookout. The sad conclusion is that the drivers werent looking where they were going.
Now why they were not IFR is a different matter, I dont know the icing situation at the time, perhaps that was the reason. If so why did they accept the trip, "company pressure"? Is pleading safety frowned on on the RAF? Was the ILS/radar at destination u/s? Why didnt the service put them in a Herc instead. Although rated for such conditions just how much experience did they actually have in real grubbing? I doubt very much. Terribly sad, and a great loss to so many.
Iam sure this post will offend someone, for which I apologise in advance, but I feel too little attention has been payed to the commonsense aspect of this event.
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Looks very similar to Sundeland crashes about 60 years ago (hit high ground in bad weather).
If you are in a Chinook with full IF gear there is no way that you should be grovelling around with a full load of passengers aboard.
Imagine, just above you, flying into Prestwick in an aeroplane are a couple of pilots in shirt sleeves and 300 passengers going to the airport. Mr RAF has enough nav equipment to take him to the same destination, but decides to travel visual.
The basic thing here is airmanship, and I really think that despite any supposedly engine problems, you must look at basics and wonder why passengers were subject to pilots not seeing where they were going.
If you are in a Chinook with full IF gear there is no way that you should be grovelling around with a full load of passengers aboard.
Imagine, just above you, flying into Prestwick in an aeroplane are a couple of pilots in shirt sleeves and 300 passengers going to the airport. Mr RAF has enough nav equipment to take him to the same destination, but decides to travel visual.
The basic thing here is airmanship, and I really think that despite any supposedly engine problems, you must look at basics and wonder why passengers were subject to pilots not seeing where they were going.
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I do not think the FADEC was the direct cause of this accident, however, it does have a significance. Because of the ongoing problems with it (old software, no-one able to debug it) the usual procedure for bringing a new type of aircraft into service appears to have been bypassed for reasons not publically known (how long overdue in service was the HC2?). If Boscombe Down had not completed their test flying then it appears that the aircraft type cannot have had a full CA release and therefore it would not normally have been in squadron service i.e. NO-ONE should have been flying it operationally. (The pre-service test flying was stopped because the test pilots refused to continue until the FADEC glitches were sorted. Therefore icing trials were not completed and the aircraft was not cleared for flight in cold cloud conditions).
It seems these guys were ordered to fly in circumstances they were very unhappy about, especially as the aircraft had other unserviceabilities. Anyone not having seen active military service will perhaps not understand the pressure on these guys to go ahead despite their concerns. (NI being an operational theatre, a court martial is a possible alternative!). If the aircraft did not have an icing clearance then there was no IFR option - so please stop bleating on about it. We all know these guys should have been on an IFR flight or in the bar. The crew knew it too. They wanted to take a Mk1 which had that IFR option and requested it. Instead they were ordered to take an aircraft of questionable serviceability over the sea in poor weather, well below MSA and below reliable radio navaid coverage. Why? Never published. They would probably have been obliged to rely on Dead Reckoning backed up by a GPS (which apparently had previously been giving some significant cross-track errors prior to the final flight). At the end of the day they were probably finally killed by a simple navigational error followed by CFIT.
Military discipline sadly appears to have over-ruled airmanship (and the normal flight authorisation safety net) and the rest is now history. Jon Tapper and Rick Cook were not grossly negligent, they were high calibre, intelligent and experienced guys carrying out bad orders to the best of their ability and they paid for it with their lives. Why the flight was allowed to take place in those circumstances is another matter. The label of gross negligence is perhaps better placed elsewhere, further up the chain. Labelling the deceased crew with it was a scandal.
RIP Guys. The truth is out there. Let's hope it comes out soon.
[This message has been edited by Skycop (edited 18 October 1999).]
It seems these guys were ordered to fly in circumstances they were very unhappy about, especially as the aircraft had other unserviceabilities. Anyone not having seen active military service will perhaps not understand the pressure on these guys to go ahead despite their concerns. (NI being an operational theatre, a court martial is a possible alternative!). If the aircraft did not have an icing clearance then there was no IFR option - so please stop bleating on about it. We all know these guys should have been on an IFR flight or in the bar. The crew knew it too. They wanted to take a Mk1 which had that IFR option and requested it. Instead they were ordered to take an aircraft of questionable serviceability over the sea in poor weather, well below MSA and below reliable radio navaid coverage. Why? Never published. They would probably have been obliged to rely on Dead Reckoning backed up by a GPS (which apparently had previously been giving some significant cross-track errors prior to the final flight). At the end of the day they were probably finally killed by a simple navigational error followed by CFIT.
Military discipline sadly appears to have over-ruled airmanship (and the normal flight authorisation safety net) and the rest is now history. Jon Tapper and Rick Cook were not grossly negligent, they were high calibre, intelligent and experienced guys carrying out bad orders to the best of their ability and they paid for it with their lives. Why the flight was allowed to take place in those circumstances is another matter. The label of gross negligence is perhaps better placed elsewhere, further up the chain. Labelling the deceased crew with it was a scandal.
RIP Guys. The truth is out there. Let's hope it comes out soon.
[This message has been edited by Skycop (edited 18 October 1999).]
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Well said Skycop. Piston Broke, if you knew these guys and the job that they did when they were not on detachment to NI then you would be in no position to query their experience in crap wx. All UK mil Helo pilots are trained to operate in marginal wx as they routinely have to operate in NI, Bosnia, Kosovo, Falkland Islands etc etc so that we can support the British Army at all times in order for the Army to achieve their goals.
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Gentlemen, when I penned last evenings post I was aware that perhaps I had made a simplistic judgement, hence the apology. Today I’ve read the Pilot Magazine article and also your replies and now feel a little more in command of my thoughts. I was astonished to learn of the Delaware incident, and all other FADEC problems, I had no idea. Still, let me to run through the post on this thread;
PVNS, (17 Oct) I agree entirely with the sad fact that this case will run and run as there is no Proof. I once took a Chinook (not this variant, I admit) to it’s top whack, perhaps 140Kt and found it most unpleasant and I can sympathize with the instrument panel point raised by Hydraulic Palm Tree (HPT, if I may?)
HPT, I note that your remarks (17 Oct) re overtemps seem limited to starts or have you seen them on flight too? I think this is a important point, and if so limited does not necessarily reflect on the FADEC performance in flight. However I cannot see why wx & icing clearance are a red herring, and as this accident occurred in low cloud and poor vis this must be a factor; can you or anyone else please quote the Met actual/forecast for the area, along with icing levels? Also to judge fairly we need to know the icing clearance of the Chinook.
barsandstars, bear in mind that the Chinook is one of the very few helos cleared to fly in only LIGHT icing conditions. However I feel compelled to object to your “Mr RAF…enough nav equipment”. Military nav equipment historically lags a decade or more behind what’s found in even basic club aircraft, though in this case the advanced TANS was reasonably up to date. As Devil’s advocate, though, I would be looking hard at the DR plot.
Skycop, I agree entirely, and find it incredible that a product rejected by Boscombe Down could ever find its way into squadron service. Your remark re “ordered to fly…” is exactly what I meant by ”company pressure”. As an ex-mil pilot I can visualize the pressure these guys were put under, this is exactly my point; [theory…] some poor sod was tasked to fly a new and untrusted Chinook variant on a VIP trip in vile wx. He objected and asked for a good old Mk 1 but was told that none was available (perhaps one wasn’t, perhaps it was just politically expedient to fly these bods in the new cab). Perhaps he tried to cry “Safety” and got told “You an operational RAF helo jock or a pussy? Eh? Sort youself out!!Go fly!!” I fancy military discipline, as you suggested, may be a major cause of this accident, and feel your summary of “carrying out bad orders to the best of their ability “ is likely to be right on the mark.
HTP. Sorry again, I knew I’d upset someone, I didn’t question their ability, I only speculated on their experience in such conditions and meant no criticism by it. I will stand in the front rank to deny their gross negligence, an outrageous and unsustainable slur. However they did fly into a stuffed cloud whilst grubbing at low level when anyone , by choice, would have been IFR at FL100. I, too, have spent many years grubbing like this amongst the terrain, the management and my better judgement in Chinooks and various civvy types.
Ideally we’d like to know how they got there. Ultimately I just think they were suckered into an all too human mistake.
PVNS, (17 Oct) I agree entirely with the sad fact that this case will run and run as there is no Proof. I once took a Chinook (not this variant, I admit) to it’s top whack, perhaps 140Kt and found it most unpleasant and I can sympathize with the instrument panel point raised by Hydraulic Palm Tree (HPT, if I may?)
HPT, I note that your remarks (17 Oct) re overtemps seem limited to starts or have you seen them on flight too? I think this is a important point, and if so limited does not necessarily reflect on the FADEC performance in flight. However I cannot see why wx & icing clearance are a red herring, and as this accident occurred in low cloud and poor vis this must be a factor; can you or anyone else please quote the Met actual/forecast for the area, along with icing levels? Also to judge fairly we need to know the icing clearance of the Chinook.
barsandstars, bear in mind that the Chinook is one of the very few helos cleared to fly in only LIGHT icing conditions. However I feel compelled to object to your “Mr RAF…enough nav equipment”. Military nav equipment historically lags a decade or more behind what’s found in even basic club aircraft, though in this case the advanced TANS was reasonably up to date. As Devil’s advocate, though, I would be looking hard at the DR plot.
Skycop, I agree entirely, and find it incredible that a product rejected by Boscombe Down could ever find its way into squadron service. Your remark re “ordered to fly…” is exactly what I meant by ”company pressure”. As an ex-mil pilot I can visualize the pressure these guys were put under, this is exactly my point; [theory…] some poor sod was tasked to fly a new and untrusted Chinook variant on a VIP trip in vile wx. He objected and asked for a good old Mk 1 but was told that none was available (perhaps one wasn’t, perhaps it was just politically expedient to fly these bods in the new cab). Perhaps he tried to cry “Safety” and got told “You an operational RAF helo jock or a pussy? Eh? Sort youself out!!Go fly!!” I fancy military discipline, as you suggested, may be a major cause of this accident, and feel your summary of “carrying out bad orders to the best of their ability “ is likely to be right on the mark.
HTP. Sorry again, I knew I’d upset someone, I didn’t question their ability, I only speculated on their experience in such conditions and meant no criticism by it. I will stand in the front rank to deny their gross negligence, an outrageous and unsustainable slur. However they did fly into a stuffed cloud whilst grubbing at low level when anyone , by choice, would have been IFR at FL100. I, too, have spent many years grubbing like this amongst the terrain, the management and my better judgement in Chinooks and various civvy types.
Ideally we’d like to know how they got there. Ultimately I just think they were suckered into an all too human mistake.
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Piston Broke, glad you can see things more clearly now. The crew were put in a situation that not many would have escaped from. If their radio navaids were not available due to their very low altitude there would have been no way of cross-checking an erroneus GPS output. A Dead Reckoning plot is next to useless over the sea - there are no track or timing check features apart from the coast - and they hit that. Over the sea in poor conditions it is easy to get a false impression of groundspeed and rate of closure. It is quite probable that they were unwittingly fully IMC, not realising they had actually coasted in until seconds before impact. Was the intercom u/s? (one of the switches in the wreckage was found in the emergency position). If the normal intercom failed just before coasting in it is quite possible that vital crew co-operation broke down at this critical moment, especially as the crew were possibly not so familiar with the switchery of this type as that of the HC1.
The passengers were of extremely high value in the anti-terrorist role (which is presumably why such a previously highly regarded crew was nominated to fly them). It was a poor management decision to "put all the eggs in one basket", especially as the basket was known to have at least one hole in it. Was this internal politics trying to show that there were really no problems with this unproven new aircraft?. When it all went terribly wrong was it perhaps more convenient to blame the dead crew rather than where it perhaps really belonged, at a senior management level?
In any event, there is so much doubt over the circumstances that it was unreasonable to apply the spiteful stigma of "Gross Negligence", especially as this was not the findings of the RAF's own Board of Inquiry. If we can all see this verdict is open to reasonable doubt then why won't the MOD? Is there a can of worms waiting to be opened? "Cause not known" would have been more satisfactory and would not have caused so much extra grief to the breaved.
The following might be considered by any future enquiry:
1. Who was responsible for ordering the crew to fly in these circumstances?
2. Who was responsible for the "Gross Negligence" verdict?
A correlation between anwers 1 and 2 would not be a great surprise to many of us.
The passengers were of extremely high value in the anti-terrorist role (which is presumably why such a previously highly regarded crew was nominated to fly them). It was a poor management decision to "put all the eggs in one basket", especially as the basket was known to have at least one hole in it. Was this internal politics trying to show that there were really no problems with this unproven new aircraft?. When it all went terribly wrong was it perhaps more convenient to blame the dead crew rather than where it perhaps really belonged, at a senior management level?
In any event, there is so much doubt over the circumstances that it was unreasonable to apply the spiteful stigma of "Gross Negligence", especially as this was not the findings of the RAF's own Board of Inquiry. If we can all see this verdict is open to reasonable doubt then why won't the MOD? Is there a can of worms waiting to be opened? "Cause not known" would have been more satisfactory and would not have caused so much extra grief to the breaved.
The following might be considered by any future enquiry:
1. Who was responsible for ordering the crew to fly in these circumstances?
2. Who was responsible for the "Gross Negligence" verdict?
A correlation between anwers 1 and 2 would not be a great surprise to many of us.
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Skycop, the more I look at this the clearer it seems to become. I have to disagree strongly with your remarks re nav and crosschecking the TANS though.
Given a dodgy GPS and with minimal radio nav coverage at 2-300ft dr should have been the order of the day, and if they had the same opinion of dr as you’ve described it would have been very irresponsible to launch at all. May I respectfully point out that the RN has been using dr alone to return to a moving ship in similar weather since the 1930s. My marginal weather training included offset NDB approaches to rigs that prevent you bumping into anything if you overshoot, we even learned to judge ground speed and rate of closure but then we were only supporting some oil company or other. Rigs are nowhere near the size of a mountain, but flying directly at them in crap wx, even when we knew where they were was just not done. They even taught us to recognize when we had gone inadvertently IMC… So when someone aims to make an actual landfall straight at a 1400ft high mountain in 300’ cloudbase and 1500m vis it seems rather imprudent to me. Why not dr in perfect safety to a point west abeam the Macrihanish VORDME (10 NNE the Mull) and then intercept a low coast at a known and shallow angle.. This also provides the “impossible” cross-cx of the suspect TANS before coasting in. That, surely, is quite basic operational dr and good airmanship. Wouldnt you slow down if theres a cliff in the fog ahead? Shoulda diverted to Prestwick with a throbbing great VOR at TRN to help if you ask me. A sliver of doubt is beginning to trouble me over this whole nav business. It all looks to me like a CAVOK plan that has ignored the implications of lousy wx conditions both in the planning and the execution, with several elementary principles of Navigation (intentionally capitalized) simply omitted. Could it be that the RAF of the 1990s has become so adept at following a push-button nav-plan that dr and foul wx visual div nav have fallen into disuse on the squadrons?
Additionally, I find it hard to see how an experienced aviator (be it the crew, the Ops Officer or the CO/Flight Commander) would plan anything (except a follow-up SAR mission and a fleet of taxis) around a VMC-only transit from Ireland to E Scotland via Glen Mor (I assume that was the route) given the wx. I should have thought it almost certain that wx in the valley would be worse than offshore, ie cloud on the deck, and then its a very long way to hovertaxi in fog disregarding every rule in the low flying manual. Given the pax were such high value how could they even consider risking a forced landing in the bundhu or the hazards of mountain rescue flying techniques?
This is one big can of worms.
My feeling is this is an institutional problem that involves the servicewide attitudes to aircraft acceptance procedures, procurement, squadron and group maintenance, the training system, CRM and, as someone said, military discipline.
Christ, cant blame the RAF, make it an engine runaway and blame the crew!
Stinks.
Given a dodgy GPS and with minimal radio nav coverage at 2-300ft dr should have been the order of the day, and if they had the same opinion of dr as you’ve described it would have been very irresponsible to launch at all. May I respectfully point out that the RN has been using dr alone to return to a moving ship in similar weather since the 1930s. My marginal weather training included offset NDB approaches to rigs that prevent you bumping into anything if you overshoot, we even learned to judge ground speed and rate of closure but then we were only supporting some oil company or other. Rigs are nowhere near the size of a mountain, but flying directly at them in crap wx, even when we knew where they were was just not done. They even taught us to recognize when we had gone inadvertently IMC… So when someone aims to make an actual landfall straight at a 1400ft high mountain in 300’ cloudbase and 1500m vis it seems rather imprudent to me. Why not dr in perfect safety to a point west abeam the Macrihanish VORDME (10 NNE the Mull) and then intercept a low coast at a known and shallow angle.. This also provides the “impossible” cross-cx of the suspect TANS before coasting in. That, surely, is quite basic operational dr and good airmanship. Wouldnt you slow down if theres a cliff in the fog ahead? Shoulda diverted to Prestwick with a throbbing great VOR at TRN to help if you ask me. A sliver of doubt is beginning to trouble me over this whole nav business. It all looks to me like a CAVOK plan that has ignored the implications of lousy wx conditions both in the planning and the execution, with several elementary principles of Navigation (intentionally capitalized) simply omitted. Could it be that the RAF of the 1990s has become so adept at following a push-button nav-plan that dr and foul wx visual div nav have fallen into disuse on the squadrons?
Additionally, I find it hard to see how an experienced aviator (be it the crew, the Ops Officer or the CO/Flight Commander) would plan anything (except a follow-up SAR mission and a fleet of taxis) around a VMC-only transit from Ireland to E Scotland via Glen Mor (I assume that was the route) given the wx. I should have thought it almost certain that wx in the valley would be worse than offshore, ie cloud on the deck, and then its a very long way to hovertaxi in fog disregarding every rule in the low flying manual. Given the pax were such high value how could they even consider risking a forced landing in the bundhu or the hazards of mountain rescue flying techniques?
This is one big can of worms.
My feeling is this is an institutional problem that involves the servicewide attitudes to aircraft acceptance procedures, procurement, squadron and group maintenance, the training system, CRM and, as someone said, military discipline.
Christ, cant blame the RAF, make it an engine runaway and blame the crew!
Stinks.
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Piston Broke, there may be some truth in what you say although I am unsure why you think that low flying rules were broken, the WX limits for SH are surprisingly low. As you can see, the more you think about this the more doubt there is. I agree, perhaps the sortie should not have gone. So why were the crew grossly negligent for going as ordered? As I implied, being unable to defend themselves they were the softest target.
[This message has been edited by Skycop (edited 19 October 1999).]
[This message has been edited by Skycop (edited 19 October 1999).]
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A sad sad tale of cock-ups that starts at the top and seeps its way down. You're right pissed & wotsit, they couldn't blame the whole RAF, that would never do. Not nice.
[This message has been edited by Pinger (edited 19 October 1999).]
[This message has been edited by Pinger (edited 20 October 1999).]
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Pinger, I'm glad you amended your comments. Your previous post was completely uncalled for. However, if you still want some friendly banter - Sorry to see that you had to settle for a Navy job..
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May the Force be with you - and may Gravity treat you gently..
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May the Force be with you - and may Gravity treat you gently..
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Just found this web site but been interested in the chinook crash for a while. Hope you don't mind a non helicopter type butting in. Having read the full board of inquiry (BOI) I think that in many ways talk of engine failures, FADEC problems, spurious warning captions etc. etc. is missing the point somewhat. All of the previous messages are just speculation. True, most are informed speculation from what appears to be experienced operators but they are still just opinions. Which is what the BOI was. Speculation and opinion from experienced chinook operators. In his closing comments the president of the BOI said, "With no ADR or CVR, survivors or eyewitnesses, the Board based its findings on logical argument derived from the limited evidence available. There were MANY POTENTIAL CAUSES OF THE ACCIDENT and despite detailed and in depth analysis, the Board was UNABLE TO DETERMINE A DEFINITE CAUSE."
And this is the whole point, all of the conclusions were best guesses. No one can argue that good pilots don't fly into the lumpy stuff. We all know they do. But in this case there is no conclusive proof of anything apart from they are all dead. Rick and Jon may have made a mistake but we can never be 100% sure so why do we condemn them?
Just a thought from someone who has only flown in helicopters as baggage.
And this is the whole point, all of the conclusions were best guesses. No one can argue that good pilots don't fly into the lumpy stuff. We all know they do. But in this case there is no conclusive proof of anything apart from they are all dead. Rick and Jon may have made a mistake but we can never be 100% sure so why do we condemn them?
Just a thought from someone who has only flown in helicopters as baggage.