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Valley Hawks Grounded.


spike7451

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I wonder if this will have a knock on affect to the Tornado fleet?

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-north-west-wales-10782263

All training Hawks at RAF Valley on Anglesey have been grounded after engineers detected a fault in an aircraft.

The problem with the ejector seat of one of the craft was spotted during an on-site inspection on Tuesday morning.

Hawks have also been grounded at RNAS Yeovilton in Somerset, RAF Leeming in Yorkshire and RAF Scampton in Lincolnshire.

The fleet will not be permitted to fly until each aircraft has been inspected.

There are currently around 50 Hawks based at RAF Valley, which provides advanced pilot training.

A source at RAF Valley told BBC Wales the fault was found due to the scrutiny of one of their local engineers.

It is not known how long it will take to inspect all the aircraft.

A Ministry of Defence (MOD) spokesperson said: "Safety of our air crews is of paramount importance.

"Although there may be a minor disruption to training flights while we investigate, there will be no impact on operations."

The grounding request affects all training Hawk aircraft in the UK that are fitted with a mark 10 ejection seat.

According to the MOD this will also affect the Red Arrows' ability to fly.

Edited by spike7451
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Had some info through at work on this from an interview,

Hawk and Tucano training aircraft have been grounded as a result of a crack discovered on the Martin Baker mark 10 ejection seat fitted to the aircraft.

"Safety of our aircrews is of paramount importance. Although there may be a minor disruption to training flights while we investigate, there will be no impact on operations"

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Unusual for something like to happen to a seat, as MB are pretty thorough in their builds and inspections. Hopefully it's just the one seat, and the damage caused by an erk when fitting it, which is serious enough, but not as serious as the whole fleet having problems.

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Unusual for something like to happen to a seat, as MB are pretty thorough in their builds and inspections. Hopefully it's just the one seat, and the damage caused by an erk when fitting it, which is serious enough, but not as serious as the whole fleet having problems.

Unfortunately its not, it is a structural snag (crack!!) and has been found on a couple of aircraft. Bit of a blow for us at Culdrose as its our air day and they are about the only aircraft that make noise in numbers, and what with the vulcan as well? Just as well it isnt raining ........... yet

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