Iconic Aircraft Aviation Forum

by **Xplumberlives** » Mon Mar 16, 2009 8:49 am

Give the OLD one a THWACK from me too! :ymapplause:

by **Old Rigger** » Mon Mar 16, 2009 8:07 pm

Xpl, TBH, that was my first comment to the SNCO and the guy on brakes, but normally you either work on helicopters or you are fixed with with bang seats, a few did both, the ground crew bods had never worked on ejection seat aircraft and as is allways the way things like ejection seat lectures were not deemed necessary for helicopte peeps, even though management still put them on duty crash crew to recover fixed wing aircraft etc.

Even at a Tornado base where everyone was aware, the idiots in charge came up with a brilliant idea, if there was a fire alarm in one of the hangars the off duty guards and guard commander would leg it to the hanger hitch up a towing arm and put someone in the seat and off you go, when I pointed out that we had suppliers/painters etc and could not tow aircraft or get in the cockpit, one Warrant Officer started to argue and lost within 5 mins of opening his mouth, total muppets.

by **Xplumberlives** » Tue Mar 17, 2009 8:43 am

Old Rigger wrote:Xpl, TBH, that was my first comment to the SNCO and the guy on brakes, but normally you either work on helicopters or you are fixed with with bang seats, a few did both, the ground crew bods had never worked on ejection seat aircraft and as is allways the way things like ejection seat lectures were not deemed necessary for helicopte peeps, even though management still put them on duty crash crew to recover fixed wing aircraft etc.

Even at a Tornado base where everyone was aware, the idiots in charge came up with a brilliant idea, if there was a fire alarm in one of the hangars the off duty guards and guard commander would leg it to the hanger hitch up a towing arm and put someone in the seat and off you go, when I pointed out that we had suppliers/painters etc and could not tow aircraft or get in the cockpit, one Warrant Officer started to argue and lost within 5 mins of opening his mouth, total muppets.

Mick

I take your points above and to be brutally honest the THWACK I asked M.F. to hand out was for Ducati Boy hence my use of "THE OLD ONE" tag, it's his birthday and he's quite long in the tooth!

Sorry for causing the misunderstanding.

Dave

by **Old Rigger** » Tue Mar 17, 2009 1:40 pm

No problems

, I thought it was worth mentioning anyway as some might not understand some of the ridiculous insular thinking that occasionally pops up, even in the military, over safety with regards to things that go bang.

Understand with regards to DB

, but in the scheme of things I am not that far behind him

(well 5 years behind), ok I get your point

by **Ducati Boy** » Tue Mar 17, 2009 5:03 pm

Mayfly:

Ouch Pam, I should have expected that one! :))

As for the plasters, I think a pair of those bikers riding gloves, the ones with re-inforced carbon fibre knuckle protection, might assist in preventing cases of plumbers knuckle drag/tarmac interface erosion. =))

Now then XP: I say old bean is there no respect for tooth length anymore? :-o

Anyway, I prefer to be known as "mature" or "experienced" not "the old one"

So you can't borrow my biking gloves, hope your knuckles wear out! :ymdevil:

Old Rigger: Mick, you were absolutely right to give the crew grief. What beats me though, is that ANY airman/person would get into ANY aircraft with a red triangle on the side without thinking" Are the seats safe" and if they did not know what that meant, report it to their senior man/armourer and get it properly checked out.

Had I been the line chief on that unit, the aircraft Captain would have enjoyed an irate chiefs "Erroneous Pilot's Behavioural Correction Lecture", not an enjoyable experience for him!

My boot would have been buried to the tenth lace hole in the i/c towing teams chuff box too. I would want to know, helicopters unit or not, why my airmen/airpersons had no apparent awareness of the existence of lethal devices in/on/around a war plane and why they had no understanding of their Health and Safety responsibiliy to their fellow workers and themselves. ~x(

I am sure you agree that an awareness of the need for certain, crucial safety devices to be fitted is a matter of basic airmanship for all who work on aircraft. It should be an automatic, second nature procedure to any aircraft tech, of any trade and always driven by the old adage "If you don't know, ASK! Someone knew to call for a Tonka man, so the unfamiliar Tonka should have sat where it was until you came to confirm it was safe to move it. That was standard survival behaviour in my day, perhaps due to our overwhelming desire not to die prematurely while exploring space flight, without re-entry equipment! :-o

You however, done well!

Anyway 62 is not old

by **Old Rigger** » Tue Mar 17, 2009 7:09 pm

Agree with all you said DB and I was just being polite in recalling the story as usually I get told that you would not say that to a higher rank/officer

.

But it also brings to mind another anomoly at St Athan, this is a place that should know about things that go bang, but once again there where holes in the system, yes we had bang seat lectures but no one one cared about the tanks and pylons etc as the prep for arrival at Saints was clean aircraft and dummy carts fitted.

What happened was a Bruggen aircraft was due in on the Friday for the 16 FI wing change, but on the wed the sqd decided to send it on a sortie to the ranges oop north, so on its return to Bruggen it got that usual in flight 'emergency' of fumes in cockpit a snag that usually one cannot find a fault so change a few things on spec. So it landed and was seen in and the words came down from on high that by the time it was fixed it would end up late for the wing change so how many extra days do you need to remove pylons, tanks, cbls's etc and put them back on and do the pylon rigging, I told them and they agreed. Then came the 'well why is it not in the hangar', I had to explain in no uncertain terms that 'live' aircraft are not permitted in the hangar, so bck came the response 'then get the armourers to remove the carts and kit', their response we are not authorised/trained and neither do we have the kit to dothat work. Hours later we had dispensation to put aircraft into hangar, and a team came across from Coningsby to offload and disarm the pylons, and bring the stands with again dispensation to store them in a maintenance hangar. Then it was repeated in reverse at he end for return to Bruggen, but rules is for pond life not for officers most times :ymdevil:

by **Ducati Boy** » Wed Mar 18, 2009 3:15 pm

Old Rigger wrote:Agree with all you said DB and I was just being polite in recalling the story as usually I get told that you would not say that to a higher rank/officer .

But it also brings to mind another anomoly at St Athan, this is a place that should know about things that go bang, but once again there where holes in the system, yes we had bang seat lectures but no one one cared about the tanks and pylons etc as the prep for arrival at Saints was clean aircraft and dummy carts fitted.

What happened was a Bruggen aircraft was due in on the Friday for the 16 FI wing change, but on the wed the sqd decided to send it on a sortie to the ranges oop north, so on its return to Bruggen it got that usual in flight 'emergency' of fumes in cockpit a snag that usually one cannot find a fault so change a few things on spec. So it landed and was seen in and the words came down from on high that by the time it was fixed it would end up late for the wing change so how many extra days do you need to remove pylons, tanks, cbls's etc and put them back on and do the pylon rigging, I told them and they agreed. Then came the 'well why is it not in the hangar', I had to explain in no uncertain terms that 'live' aircraft are not permitted in the hangar, so bck came the response 'then get the armourers to remove the carts and kit', their response we are not authorised/trained and neither do we have the kit to dothat work. Hours later we had dispensation to put aircraft into hangar, and a team came across from Coningsby to offload and disarm the pylons, and bring the stands with again dispensation to store them in a maintenance hangar. Then it was repeated in reverse at he end for return to Bruggen, but rules is for pond life not for officers most times

No surprises there then Mick! Don't get me onto the subject of B Eng O's, especially shiney new ones fresh from Cranwell! :-o

Things were fine in the days when SNCO's were seen and recognised as the core of the RAF. Engineering Officers were great in the days when they left the engineering management to WO/SNCO's and just walked the black Labrador a lot. :))

I remember when young officers were told to trust their SNCO's and listen to their advice. But by the time I left, modern management techniques ensured they were being taught NOT to trust SNCO's, but to assert themselves and make sure the pond life knew who was the boss. :o)