News just broke on Headlines Today: the team investigating the April 29 crash of a brand new Indian Air Force Hawk advanced jet trainer has apparently attributed the crash 90 per cent to pilot error. The remaining ten per cent has been attributed to questionable performance of the Hawk AJT’s “regulated take-off” thrust setting. According to the investigation, the pilots were not supposed to have engaged regulated take-off for the training sortie (something the people at BAE Systems have also apparently testified to the inquiry team). At the same time, the report says that under no circumstances should the regulated take-off setting have resulted in an accident. A miscommunication over radio between the two pilots and between the pilots and ATC have also been suggested as a possible contributor to the accident.
So is BAE Systems vindicated by the report? Unlikely. According to sources, the report also slams BAE Systems on three counts: performance of the pilot-machine interface during take-off and survivability of the aircraft such as it is. It was not in the purview of the investigative team to go into the details of spares, though it is still open to investigation if there were technical faults involved as well. Also, according to some reports, BAE Systems has been mounting a highly unsavoury unofficial campaign by painting the IAF as a bunch of incompetent chaps who don’t know how to handle new aircraft, or how frequently to use them.
WoW! Here begins the blame game. Oops! I mean air crash investigation……..A pilot error. Was those two pilots were rookie? Nope! They were trained instructors, graduating from a RAF school. Question is this if they were not qualified, how did they graduated? Who passed them? ……Its easy to make a joiner officer ‘Bali Ka Bakra’ for hiding flaws!. It seems like BAE is enjoying IAF’s top brass and their style of speaking.” BAE KI JAI HO”.
If you’re not supposed to fly in some configuration, then why was that configuration setting not removed in the first place? This is basic engineering design, sir… if you don’t want me to use a feature in your product, and if use of that feature can be fatal, then the presence of that feature is a health hazard. Why is it there then? Looks like the IAF are suckers for gora abuse. Proud bunch they are.