Someone's pocket money has been stopped

That's an expensive mistake to pay for. 😁
Someone left the engine cover on!💥
No way could they all have missed one or two of the lower engine intake covers being fitted, surely that's not been confirmed yet?
I doubt it was the upper one, as that's kept closed anyway without engines running, so I doubt there is even a cover for that for normal operation.

Assuming procedures haven't changed much, aren't much different on the boats compared to land, and it was a normal departure......
It would have needed to have been actually fitted on the previous after flight service (AF)
Then it would have needed to be missed by 1-2 groundcrew when doing the before flight service, and the supervisor (if he went outside, but that's doubtful)
Then it would need to be missed by 1-2 groundcrew and 1 aircrew, during the pre-flight walk around (looking in the engine intakes is high up the list of checks)
Then it would need to be missed on start-up by the groundcrew, and also the aircrew, can't imagine the engine functioned all that well before that, and this would get noticed, especially as it's single engine.
Then it would need to be missed on final departure checks and taxi.

That's a big chain of events to go wrong.

It could have sucked up a cover from something else mind, something much less noticeable or from another aircraft/ piece of equipment, which is much, much more common, as is sucking up birds!
 
They are sh1t, the yanks have admitted they are overpriced and unreliable and not fit for what they needed.
 
My knowledge of fighter jet controls is limited to pretty much nothing but wouldn't something have shown up on the dials or computer screen or whatever about the cover been left on?
 
They are sh1t, the yanks have admitted they are overpriced and unreliable and not fit for what they needed.
Most new jets start out ****, it takes many, many, many years for them to become reliable, and then by that time they're old tech.

As for "fit for purpose", it's hard to design something that will suit current needs with the long a design process, never mind 20-50 years into the future is what/ how jets needs to be designed.
 
My knowledge of fighter jet controls is limited to pretty much nothing but wouldn't something have shown up on the dials or computer screen or whatever about the cover been left on?
No chance, think of a brand new jet as like being 20 years back in time. For example, it probably has a CD drive for it's software, or even worse get's plugged into another computer and linked by a old school serial cable, where as you might expect it to be a flash card, USB 2.0 stick or wi-fi updates. There wouldn't be any sensors for covers.

I would expect the engine wouldn't have functioned correct from the start (it's only got one), which would have given some sort of warning, maybe excess vibration, that's a common one. If that was the case it wouldn't have been able to take off, as in not allowed to take off with amber engine warnings.

The intake blank (if fitted to that jet) would have been sucked in on engine start, or the engine might not have lit as could have been starved of oxygen or airflow, then when the intake blank got sucked in there probably would have been a bang as more airflow lit the fuel. Unless it could get enough air from the other intakes, before they throttle up. But they normally throttle up to max before letting the brakes off.

To me, engine failure a bit before the ramp would be far more likely, it's too late to stop at that point.

I probably shouldn't write anymore, and have probably already written too much, albeit using knowledge from other aircraft.
 
Last edited:
Very interesting that Andy. What do you think then may be the main cause - engine failure?
 
Very interesting that Andy. What do you think then may be the main cause - engine failure?
It's normally engines which cause a crash on take off, too late to do anything about it, the most vulnerable time for a Jet.

What caused the engine failure could be one of many things, something going down the engine is a good shout but I don't see how it could be an intake blank, it's probably the least likely thing that could ever go down an engine. I expect more groundcrew have gone down engines than fitted engine blanks!
 
No chance, think of a brand new jet as like being 20 years back in time. For example, it probably has a CD drive for it's software, or even worse get's plugged into another computer and linked by a old school serial cable, where as you might expect it to be a flash card, USB 2.0 stick or wi-fi updates. There wouldn't be any sensors for covers.

I would expect the engine wouldn't have functioned correct from the start (it's only got one), which would have given some sort of warning, maybe excess vibration, that's a common one. If that was the case it wouldn't have been able to take off, as in not allowed to take off with amber engine warnings.

The intake blank (if fitted to that jet) would have been sucked in on engine start, or the engine might not have lit as could have been starved of oxygen or airflow, then when the intake got sucked in there probably would have been a bang as more airflow lit the fuel. Unless it could get enough air from the other intakes, before they throttle up. But they normally throttle up to make before letting the brakes off.

To me, engine failure a bit before the ramp would be far more likely, it's too late to stop at that point.

I probably shouldn't write anymore, and have probably already written too much, albeit using knowledge from other aircraft.
My uncle was an engineer in the RAF many moons ago.
 
So that's around £200m of jets we've lost in the last few weeks?

Yet Stockton can't have a new hospital which is going to cost approx £300m - great
 
So that's around £200m of jets we've lost in the last few weeks?

Yet Stockton can't have a new hospital which is going to cost approx £300m - great
They would need to find more people to work in it too. That £300m would pay a lot of contractors for a long long time though, so once it's spent it's back in the local economy to be spent again and again.

The money the forces waste is obscene though. That £200m is small fry compared to what gets blown/ wasted weekly, needlessly.
I don't mean that as the forces are not necessary (they are, albeit not as much), I mean in as much that it is incredibly inefficient, wasteful and they pay way OTT on such basic things.
 
If a group of got their way and reduced our air capabilities to zero we wouldn't be under a Tory dictatorship, hell even a British one.
 
If a group of got their way and reduced our air capabilities to zero we wouldn't be under a Tory dictatorship, hell even a British one.
Who is on about doing away with air capability to zero, who is going to take over us, and how would they get away with that?

It's worth having some air defence, but ordering a 200 Typhoons wasn't the right idea. Even keeping the 100 we ended up with was a bad idea, and selling the other 100 to the Saudi's (and them taking our most experienced guys to train the Saudi's) was an even worse idea.

As long as we're in NATO, and stay on good terms with the USA we're pretty safe. We spend about 2.5% of GDP on defence, most of the others spend 1.5%.
 
Back
Top