Douglas Barrie/LONDON
The crash of a Royal Air Force Panavia Tornado F3 is again raising concerns as to the extent to, which a group of aircraft was inadvertently seriously damaged by contractor Airwork during maintenance on the aircraft.
The Tornado was being flown by British Aerospace pilots, on a shake down flight, on 28 September off Blackpool beach in England when the crash occurred. Both crewmembers ejected safely.
The F3 was one of several aircraft damaged during modifications undertaken by Airwork in 1993. At the time the damage was thought to have been so serious that some aircraft were expected to be written off.
BAe is half-way through a Ministry of Defence contract to rectify the damage to the F3s. Airwork was carrying out fatigue- index modification work on a batch of 25 aircraft when the problems came to light (Flight International, 9-16 June, 1993.)
As yet there is no indication that the loss of the aircraft is related to the previous problem with the Airwork-modified aircraft, although this is certain to be examined by crash investigators. It was the first flight of the F3 after modification. The accident is the latest in a series which has raised concerns over the aircraft. Service availability of the RAF's F3s has been adversely affected by several factors. Following the loss of two aircraft in 1994 and 1995, a fleet-wide Turbo-Union RB-199 engine modification is being implemented by Rolls-Royce.
Implementation of the fix has been slowed by industrial action at R-R. The F3 batch damaged by Airwork also meant that there were fewer aircraft available for front-line service.
The crashed aircraft was the third F3 to be lost this year. Two were destroyed in an air-to-air collision. This incident is likely to be blamed on pilot error when the crash report is released.
Reports on a rash of RAF aircraft losses at the beginning of this year are to be released in the next few weeks. Seven RAF aircraft were lost between January to March of this year, sparking speculation that there might be a causal link.
Senior RAF officers stress that they have looked extremely carefully at these incidents, but can identify no single common factor. They also point out that the overall accident-rate figures for this year are at worst in line with those of recent years.
Source: Flight International
