Haven't logged in for a while, but the nonsense spouted by Zero boiled my blood. All you're demonstrating is your ignorance of the role the aircraft did.
Firstly Nimrod MR4a is 90% a new aircraft. It was PAID FOR and a few months from service. The cost to scrap it was 200million, which would have operated it for years.
Piper Alpha? Nimrod had high speed transit and was able to loiter on the scene for hours directing the rescue effort. No other aircraft could do that.
Other aircraft. The US have tried to adapt the 737 into the P8. It's late and over-budget. The two underslung engines cannot are totally unsuited to the environment. The aircraft cannot operate at low-level and is suffering sever buffeting problems that they can't solve.
Liam Fox initially stated it would be a catastrophe if the aircraft was lost. He is now toeing the party line and suddenly stating it isn't a problem.
Dave and Liam have stated that SAR cover, Maritime cover and the other roles Nimrod carried out is now done by C130, Merlin helicopters and a Type 23 Frigate. Utter nonsense and a blatant lie. The C130s are all flat out servicing Afghanistan and unsuited to the role anyway. Merlin is to slow and hasn't the range. Type 23? Where?
You can stick your head in the sand, but we do need the ELINT capability of the R1 and MR2. They were supreme at what they did. Rivet Joint replacements are all 45 years old already, good deal that!
MR4a had a few minor issues around the flap hinge that had been reolved a long time ago. It was airworthy and ready to go.
As well as losing the aircraft, we're also losing the expertise that went with it. That's not something that can be replaced overnight. Sadly, we've replaced one criminally incompetent Government, with another, that has totally betrayed the armed forces, preferring to spend the money on ludicrously expensive and useless wind farms and overseas bribes (£10 billion worth)
|
