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Aviation History
2003
2003 - 1211.PDF
Flight International welcomes letters on any aspect of the aerospace industry. Please write to: The Editor, Flight International, Quadrant House, The Quadrant, Sutton, Surrey SM2 5AS, UK. Or e-mail flight.interna- tional@rbi.co.uk The opinions on this page do not necessarily represent those of the editor. Flight International cannot publish letters without name and address. Letters must be no more than 250 words in length. CRASHES Exonerate the Chinook pilots I refer to the report of the crash-landing near Basra on 2 May 2003 of a Royal Air Force Chinook that, amongst others, was carrying Major General Robin Brims commander of the British Forces in Basra. Fuel pressure was reported as having collapsed, leading to the engines suddenly cutting out, while the aircraft was at 100 ft (30m). This caused the Chinook to nose dive into the ground, but extremely capable piloting narrowly averted disaster and the loss of all onboard. This is an interesting parallel to the Chinook of the the same type that crashed on the Mull of Kintyre on 2 June 1994 for as yet unexplained reasons, when all onboard per ished. Notwithstanding that the RAF's board of enquiry could not apportion blame, the pilots were accused of gross negligence by two senior RAF "reviewing officers" who were in direct line of command, hardly an unbiased situation. Five separate investiga tions over the years maintained that the cause of the accident cannot be established on the known facts and that the pilots cannot be blamed without "any doubt whatsoever", according to the RAF's very own rules. The pilots have not yet been exonerated. Several possible causes for the Mull of Kintyre crash have been mooted, including electronic fuel control malfunctions, possibly caused by electromagnetic interference (EMI), particularly the effect of the powerful UK TETRA network mobile telephones used by public services and military personnel, for example, and the unadmitted suspi cion that such a call was made to or from the aircraft at the time of the crash. Can anyone who was in the Basra Chinook crash-landing offer an assurance that no-one was using a portable communications device in the cabin? Fairness, if nothing else, dictates that the Mull of Kintyre disaster should be given a fair hearing particularly in the wake of last year's Lords select committee finding that the pilots could not be blamed. Capt Ralph Kohn FRAeS Compiler of the Macdonald report (April 2000), Surrey, UK Protectionism? the USA is just as guilty Re Paul Lewis's article "USA blasts A400M engine choice" (Flight International, 13-19 May). For Mr Lieberman to call this blatant pro tectionism is typical of the USA kettle calling the European pot black. If you fit any US equipment to a European military aircraft, the USA retains a veto on its export sales. Experience, time and time again, has shown that when the USA vetoes a European military aircraft sales bid, it then offers instead an all-US aircraft to the customer. THAT is "blatant protectionism". The USA has tried every trick in the book to kill off the A400M pro gramme - the disastrous Lockheed Martin C-130J option to existing C- 130 customers, for example, plus endless pressure on the UK to pur chase the Boeing C-17 instead of the A400M. This follows the expe riences with the engine in the Gripen, the TI radar in the Tor nado, economic pressure on Ger many to purchase the Boeing Hor net 2000 instead of the Eurofighter and, when that failed, the endless efforts to force Germany to select a US radar for the Eurofighter. All blatant USA protectionism. Why aren't the USA's "tricks" more widely publicised? Why isn't the full justification for selecting a non-US engine for the A400M spelt out - cost is not the only selection criterion, especially if Europe wishes to retain independent export options. E G Stickley Military Aircraft Spares Poole, UK Why no old Brits at Paris? So at the Paris air show celebrating the 100th anniversary of aviation not one single aircraft has been entered as being of British or UK origin? What a sad, sad, reflection of how our country (and industry) has been led and managed over the last few years. (Or is this some ridicu lous political act in regard to the French stance on the Iraq conflict?) Furthermore, if Concorde is able to make a fly-past at the show 1 hope everybody watching reflects that for the first time in the history of civilisation a more rapid form of transport is being eliminated in favour of a slower one. Truly history in the making! Peter Johnson Gloucester, UK Regional jets are just small It seems to me from your issue on regional aircraft (Flight International 13-19 May) that there is really no such thing as a regional jet or regional airline industry, merely small aircraft and bigger aircraft and those who can operate them profitably and those who cannot. In the USA, the existence of a sepa rate regional industry seems to have nothing to do with the ordi nary economics of the real world, and everything to do with labour relations. It is an entirely artificial creation, much as the whole notion of codeshares. Tony Kilbride Newdigate, Surrey, UK 15-22 June Paris Air Show Paris, France exposants@salon-du-bourget.fr www.paris-air-show.com 19-22 June Kehl Air Show Kehl, Germany info@aero-club-kehl.de 14-17 July International Air & Space Symposium & Exhibition Dayton, Ohio, USA Tel:+1703 264 7530 merries@aiaa.org www.aiaa.org/dayton2003 18-20 July Royal International Air Tattoo RAF Fairford, UK www.airtattoo.intheuk.com 19-24 August MAKS Airshow Moscow, Russia www.maks.ru 30 August-1 September Canadian International Airshow Toronto, Canada admin@cias.org www.cias.org 8-12 September Aerospace Conference and Exhibition Montreal, Canada Tel:+1604473 9664 info@aerospace-na.com 9-12 September WAEA Seattle, Washington, USA www.waea.org 14-17 September ACI-NA 12th Annual Conference Tampa Bay, Florida, USA Tel:+1202 293 8500 ext 3019 apeters@aci-na.org 28-30 September Cargo Facts 2003 Seattle, Washington, USA Tel: +1 206 587 6537 kkoch@cargofacts.com 7-9 October NBAA Orlando, Florida, USA Tel: +1 202 783-9000 www.nbaa.org 21-22 October Aircraft Asset Management New York, USA events@everestevents.co.uk For a full list of events see flightinternational www.flightinternational.com FLIGHT INTERNATIONAL 20-26 MAY 2003 45
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