Mick Smith - Times Online - WBLG

Why Des Browne Misled Parliament Over the Safety of the RAF's Nimrod Aircraft

The damning verdict given by coroner Andrew Walker on the deaths of 14 men in an RAF Nimrod spy plane that exploded over Afghanistan on 2 September 2006 resulted in headlines which concentrated on his call for the Nimrod fleet to be grounded and his insistence that the MoD’s “cavalier attitude to safety has to end”. That call led, ironically, to suggestions from some that Walker was passing judgement on issues he knows nothing about. I say ironically, because it is Walker’s critics who don’t know what they are talking about.

Des Browne and the full extent of the attempts to gag coroners

It was interesting to see Des Browne, the part-time defence secretary, trying this week to stop coroners criticising the Ministry of Defence. It is of course no coincidence that this feeble and ill-conceived attempt came shortly before the inquest begins into the shooting down of a special forces Hercules C130 transport aircraft over Iraq in January 2005. The inquest is more than three years late, no doubt in part because of the MoD’s stubborn refusal to provide the necessary documents. 

New Safety Fears Over the RAF's Nimrod Spy Planes

Having taken a rest over the Christmas, this blog is back with some more bad news on the Nimrod front. A new document, obtained under the freedom of information act, shows that the reassurances given about the safety of the Nimrod fleet by Defence Secretary Des Browne last month, when the board of inquiry finally reported, were just a tad too optimistic.

When Browne took over as Defence Secretary from that old Marxist rottweiller John Reid, the forces swiftly dubbed him Swiss Tony after the used car salesman in TV’s The Fast Show. I personally feel that was a bit unfair. Browne is a decent and honourable man, as he showed with his apology last month to the families of the 14 men killed when Nimrod XV230 fell apart over Afghanistan in September 2006. But it is clear he and his advisers were not aware of all the facts.

Nimrod report identified 'critical' fuel problem

The scandal of the deaths of 14 servicemen on board Nimrod XV230 continues. I am bound to say that I believed long ago that there couldn't be any more bad information coming out. But the release under the Freedom of Information Act of a report by QinetiQ, the defence company, on the extent of the leaks on board the Nimrod fleet and in particular the six aircraft flying over Afghanistan and Iraq simply beggars belief. The leaks represented a "critical" structural problem. Civilian contractors at RAF Kinloss were not only not required to pass on the substantial information they had on the leaks and how to deal with them to the Integrated Project Team which oversees how the Nimrod fleets is run, they were not required to tell the RAF technicians working on the aircraft at Kinloss that the Air Publications they were working to were out-of-date and of "little, if any, value". The problems with the leaks dated back ten years but were exacerbated by the "intense" schedule flown by the six Nimrods equipped with special video surveillance equipment fed back directly to commanders on the ground. Since these leaks were largely being caused by pressure from the aircraft's air-to-air refuelling system, never part of its original equipment and fitted as an emergency measure during the Falklands Conflict, they could not be replicated on the ground. "QinetiQ were unable to establish a clear impression of how these non-detected leaks are addressed," the report said. Or put another way, they couldn't be found so they couldn't be fixed. But so essential was the real-time video surveillance equipment to troops on the ground that the RAF had to keep the aircraft in the air quite literally, and tragically, at all costs.

Read more about the QinetiQ assessment here

Nimrod - The Warnings the MoD Ignored

Regular readers of this blog will not have been surprised by the furore over fuel leaks on board the RAF Nimrod spy plane XV230 which exploded over Afghanistan in September last year, killing all 14 on board. The emails, which showed the concerns of middle-ranking RAF officers over the leaks, are only a small piece of the picture that has emerged of problems with the aircraft, which was due to go out of service in 1995 and will not be replaced – under current plans – until 2010.

Nimrod XV230 - Our Tightwad Attitude is Killing Our Troops

The long record of cost-cutting on the Nimrod spy plane and the way in which it led to the deaths of 14 British servicemen when their aircraft exploded over Afghanistan a year ago today is as disturbing in its own way as any story I have worked on. Amid the repeated MoD insistence that nothing is wrong, one has to constantly remind oneself that 14 people died here. Both the MoD and the RAF claim that the aircraft is safe. Large numbers of crew have resigned, including the all-important training pilots, while others cling to a belief repeated like a mantra by the RAF that it would not have allowed the aircraft to fly if it were not safe.

The Nimrod Families Deserve the Truth Now

The draft report of the Board of Inquiry into the explosion of Nimrod XV230 over Afghanistan last September in which all 14 of those on board died has been circulating in the MoD and the upper reaches of the RAF for weeks now. I was told by an MoD official in early May that it was already with the MoD lawyers. The families of those who died were told they would see the report this month. Now they are told it will not be released until September. No doubt there will be “good reasons” given but if the report was ready in early May, it is difficult to see why it will take so long to tell the families how their sons, husbands, partners, or fathers died.

Blood on their Hands?

The Chief of the Air Staff Air Chief Marshal Glenn Torpy will admit in a BBC Panorama programme on Monday that two thirds of the Nimrod MR2 aircraft are currently grounded and that he is “very concerned” over the number of leaks in the air-to-air refueling system. Regular readers of this blog or the Sunday Times will know that a preliminary investigation into the crash said it was believed to have been caused by a fuel leak which caught fire. The fire then spread to a fuel tank which exploded ripping the aircraft apart and killing all 14 on board. Panorama has come up with an interesting new incident which seems to be relevant. Two years before the explosion a heating pipe on a Nimrod burst, spewing out air superheated to several hundred degrees which burned wiring and melted the seals on the fuel tanks, a serving Nimrod crew member tells Panorama.

The Scandal of the "Unsafe" RAF Aircraft Forced to Keep Flying

When an RAF Nimrod exploded over southern Afghanistan on September 2nd, everyone I know was struck by the sheer horror and tragedy of it all. It was that incident which led me to set up the In Memoriam post on this blog which lists all of those who have died in action since the British deployed to Helmand province. I railed against the MoD’s insistence that the 14-man crew of the Nimrod would not be categorised as having died in action but accepted that it was a mere technicality. Like everyone else I assumed that an inquiry would get underway and the problems that caused the explosion, and the tragic loss of life, would be sorted out. What a fool I was.