Nimrod enquiry due to report...

[Kevin T]

Well, seeing there have been only 5 serious accidents since it went into service, I'd say not...

Link

[foreverwar]

Considering less than 50 were built (then upgraded), I would say one in ten was fairly significant.

[Jon T]

If you want to be pedantic, 4 in 50 really, as one was a bird strike(ie a bird going into one of the engines), this can happen to any aircraft and is not predictable nor preventable.

Edit: also looking as the wiki article, it would actually suggest 3 in 50, as one of the accidents was a suspected to be a flare going off in the bomb bay, again an incident not linked to aircraft type, could have happened to any aircraft carrying flares.

[foreverwar]

But since I rounded it up to 50 (from 46), I was erring on the side of caution (unlike the RAF brass-hats).

So 3 in 46 = 6.5% - not odds I would want to be flying in.....

[Kevin T]

But given the number of hours they'll have clocked up...

[foreverwar]

And that makes the failure rate better/more acceptable how?..............

[G UK]

Its accidents per fleet hour you need to look at.

Example,

A fleet of 1000 aircraft fly 10 hours each and 10 have accidents.

Thats 1 accident per 1000 hours

A fleet of 100 aircraft flies 1000 hours each and have 10 accidents.

Thats 1 accident per 10,000 hours

I think you would agree the second were in fact the safer planes.

Now those Nimrods will have had a huge amount of hours on them and would also have undergone rougher treatment than most civil planes being as though they are military.

Without knowing what hours they have flown I would guess there safety record would be at least on a par with many civil airliners.

[Osem]

Surely the problem is not with the planes but with the MOD which seemingly takes so long to recognise and then properly address potential safety issues.

[slowcoach]

Originally Posted by Cobbydaler

That's because the Comet was the airframe it was based on...

Link

I know.

I remember when Comet’s were dropping out of the sky, first versions had larger than usual windows (so the passengers could have a better view) and this weakened the fuselage structure.
Once normal sized windows were fitted to later models it cured the problem of the fuselage tearing open.

When I was young there seemed to be new aircraft announced every other week, mind you we did have a lot of aircraft manufacturers then, it being just after WW11.
On a trip to Blackpool I remember seeing the English Electric P1 at Warton, it looked very futuristic at the time.

A few years ago I gave some programming tutorials to the Saudi's stationed at Warton, I was shown round the Euro Fighter which to me didn’t look all that impressive compared to my all time favourite the AVRO Vulcan.

[homealone]

Originally Posted by Osem

Surely the problem is not with the planes but with the MOD which seemingly takes so long to recognise and then properly address potential safety issues.

looking at this

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/w...re/7326714.stm

you may have a point

American Hercules planes have been fitted with ESF since the 1960s and Australian Hercules planes also have it.

The AAR problems in the Nimrod had been apparently noted, but not logged as a 'problem' with groundcrew

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/7390471.stm

I thought the telling comment in that article was this

An RAF Board of Inquiry (BoI) report into the incident concluded that ageing components and a lack of modern fire suppressants were among the "contributory factors" leading to the accident.

- hindsight is always 20/20 but I hope we can learn from these incidents & address the simple things that can help the most ...

---------- Post added at 22:06 ---------- Previous post was at 21:52 ----------

Originally Posted by slowcoach

I know.

I remember when Comet’s were dropping out of the sky, first versions had larger than usual windows (so the passengers could have a better view) and this weakened the fuselage structure.
Once normal sized windows were fitted to later models it cured the problem of the fuselage tearing open.

When I was young there seemed to be new aircraft announced every other week, mind you we did have a lot of aircraft manufacturers then, it being just after WW11.
On a trip to Blackpool I remember seeing the English Electric P1 at Warton, it looked very futuristic at the time.

A few years ago I gave some programming tutorials to the Saudi's stationed at Warton, I was shown round the Euro Fighter which to me didn’t look all that impressive compared to my all time favourite the AVRO Vulcan.

Not as much was known about 'metal fatigue' in alloys, then, shame it took those accidents to teach some of the basics

But the two aircraft that have always 'done it' for me were the 'Lightning' & the 'Vulcan' - not necessarily the P1, but the Lightning would still give many modern planes a race on rate of climb

- The restored Vulcan XH558 might actually get me to an air show, this year, hopefully

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/l...re/7393785.stm

[G UK]

The Vulcan is one of my favourite aircraft of all time as well.

I think this quote is ball sacks though

I believe, the last complete triumph in the long history of innovative British aerospace engineering.

Britain still has a very large aerospace industry and has had many triumphs since the Vulcan.




Back on topic does anybody know how many hours a Nimrod can expect to fly in a year, or better still how many hours the Nimrod fleet have flown in total?

[foreverwar]

Originally Posted by G UK

Its accidents per fleet hour you need to look at.

Example,

A fleet of 1000 aircraft fly 10 hours each and 10 have accidents.

Thats 1 accident per 1000 hours

A fleet of 100 aircraft flies 1000 hours each and have 10 accidents.

Thats 1 accident per 10,000 hours

I think you would agree the second were in fact the safer planes.

Now those Nimrods will have had a huge amount of hours on them and would also have undergone rougher treatment than most civil planes being as though they are military.

Without knowing what hours they have flown I would guess there safety record would be at least on a par with many civil airliners.

Therefore the risk factors were greater, and needed greater mitigation (which didn't appear to happen). If you know something is old and needs upgrading/fixing, it doesn't lessen the blame if this isn't done (and if you read the inquest reports, a lot of "known issues" are coming out of the woodwork).

[homealone]

Originally Posted by G UK

The Vulcan is one of my favourite aircraft of all time as well.

I think this quote is ball sacks though





Britain still has a very large aerospace industry and has had many triumphs since the Vulcan.




Back on topic does anybody know how many hours a Nimrod can expect to fly in a year, or better still how many hours the Nimrod fleet have flown in total?

tbh TSR2 & Blue Steel were also not 'triumphs', despite their worthiness on the blueprint or prototypes

but on topic, Nimrod fleet total hours, sorry ncd - did you want black ops included, or just a meaningless estimate

[foreverwar]

Originally Posted by homealone

tbh TSR2 & Blue Steel were also not 'triumphs', despite their worthiness on the blueprint or prototypes

but on topic, Nimrod fleet total hours, sorry ncd - did you want black ops included, or just a meaningless estimate

Yup - I think you will find those flights were recorded as "radar calibration" .

I went up in a couple of them, back in the day.

[G UK]

but on topic, Nimrod fleet total hours, sorry ncd - did you want black ops included, or just a meaningless estimate

Well a full itinerary of everything they've ever done would be great but I suppose a guestimate of what that type of aircraft would have flown say from someone who may have worked for the RAF would have to do

Therefore the risk factors were greater, and needed greater mitigation (which didn't appear to happen). If you know something is old and needs upgrading/fixing, it doesn't lessen the blame if this isn't done (and if you read the inquest reports, a lot of "known issues" are coming out of the woodwork).

I agree, but just how much of a risk does it take before action (and therefore cost) needs to be taken. Just because something is an issue the risk could be seen as low enough that fixing it would be uneconomical. You cannot mitigate every risk, attempting to do so would mean that no project would ever get anywhere.

Where the lines of taking action are on what probability of risk, is another matter.

Ah the joys of risk management, not.

Edit: Oh and British Aerospace triumphs since 1956 (Iintroduction of the Vulcan, Maiden flight 1952) a,ongst others

Lightning

Harrier

A couple from my own personal field

RB211

Trent