The Aviation Safety Investigation Report into the MRH-90 Taipan helicopter accident on 28 July 2023 has been released. Captain Danniel Lyon, Lieutenant Maxwell Nugent, Warrant Officer Class 2 Joseph ‘Phillip’ Laycock and Corporal Alexander Naggs tragically lost their lives in the accident when their helicopter impacted waters in the vicinity of the Whitsunday Islands during Exercise Talisman Sabre 23. This aviation safety investigation was one of the most complex conducted by Defence in recent history. Aviation safety investigations do not seek to apportion blame or liability on individuals or organisations.
Click here to view the Report, Enclosures and Factsheet.
The investigation concluded that the primary cause of the accident was an unrecognised loss of spatial orientation, commonly referred to as spatial disorientation. This refers to a situation where a pilot is unaware of their actual orientation in relation to the earth’s surface and the surrounding environment. The report identifies 196 findings, indirect findings and observations, which inform 46 recommendations across the Defence Aviation Safety Program.
The Defence Aviation Authority has accepted and is actioning all of the report’s recommendations, and has issued direction to assure these recommendations are completed, and the outcomes are assessed for the effectiveness of implementation. The wellbeing of the families of the crew, crews involved in the mission and personnel within Army Aviation remains Defence’s top priority.
The release of the report follows essential debriefings with Defence Aviation rotary-wing units, applicable Defence organisations and affected personnel. This important debriefing process was integral to ensuring the protection of the generative safety culture and the lives of the Defence aviation community. Defence has provided the report to the Inspector-General of the Australian Defence Force and Comcare and is in the process of providing it to the Queensland Coroner.
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So, sadly, pilot error.
Spatial disorientation type 1 (unrecognised) as major contributing factor, not a failing of the aircraft or its systems including the modified Top Owl helmet symbology.
So now would be a great time to put these fantastic helicopters back into service.. except we have buried them.
Were the deaths of serving members of the ADF, used as an excuse to rid the ADF of an unwanted or disliked system, the Taipan helicopter?
The deaths of these servicemen is sad, and they should be remembered and lessons learned.
The removal of these excellent helicopters for no good reason, inexcusable.
Unfortunately, you are absolutely correct.
“Were the deaths of serving members of the ADF, used as an excuse to rid the ADF of an unwanted or disliked system, the Taipan helicopter?” No.
The first UH-60Ms arrived in Australia on 30 July 2023, two days after the Lindeman Island crash. The decision to truncate the MRH program had nothing to do with the tragic loss of four Army Aviators.
Was the MRH 90 disposed of for no good reason? Again, no. There is copious data to support the decision to transition to UH-60M, some of it publicly available. You could start with the 2014 ANAO report, then read every annual report on projects of concern, which included Taipan sustainment as well as acquisition, and then maybe look at the 15 defence annual reports which mention Taipan program underperformance.
Thanks again for your input. The fatal crash was not used as an excuse to get rid of the Taipans – but it was used as an excuse to permanently ground the fleet and accelerate their disposal. We will have to continue to disagree about the overall circumstances of how the Taipan fleet was managed, noting that Australia’s struggles have not been mirrored by all other users, by any means. My understanding is that Italy, the single largest operator of the Taipan/NH90 family, has managed quite well – probably because it handed over most support functions to Leonardo early on. Yes, Taipans were expensive to support and yes the supply of spares might have been better – though paying for sufficient numbers in advance also helps.
I’ll leave the debate about why Australia ignored Ukraine’s request for the Taipans and why the Army destroyed them at breakneck speed for another day.
Dear Kym
I fully understand your point of view based on my own reading and understanding.
I do not think that the army is been honest , after all didn’t pat conroy and Richard marles state that when grounded they the helicopter was no longer flight worthy? ,while Simon Stuart was on the record saying that we didn’t say that in front the senate defence committee lead by David Fawcett.
Both Marles and Conroy were clever enough to phrase themselves carefully, referring darkly to safety concerns and safety issues that were being investigated without actually making statements that the Taipans were unsafe. You are correct that Army Aviation people – and Simon Stuart – correctly stated that the helicopters were safe to operate. To say anything else would have been impossible because it would have meant that the Taipans were allowed to fly in a knowingly unsafe condition. For all of their failings on the support side of things, safety was always the top priority – so much so that there were a couple of unnecessary groundings (in my opinion) and groundings that dragged on for far too long while bogus or marginal safety issues were checked.
After a Senior Officer of the 6th Aviation Regiment said on National T.V.” it’s great to have a Helicopter that has so many fond memories for personal of the Regiment” ( not verbatim) it’s obvious that the Taipan was white anted for within the Regiment and ably assisted by the DoD in under funding Maintenance and ignoring the Manufacturers requirements.mainly because their U.S. mates didn’t like them.
Yes, there really was/is a “Black Hawk mafia” within Army and CASG. I know who most of them are, or were, since some of them have retired.
9/11 was an inside job, too
The management failure.
Often, failures and frictions come from the organization and its dynamics (interactions, processes) and management decision (related also to misalignments between responsibility and authority).
Finally, both crashes of 2023 came imply management issues :
– the 1st one, with the non-application of manufacturers recommendations, as far as I remember.
– the 2nd one, with a management (which one : the one of the Regiment, the one that planned the Talisman Exercise ?) that, through the exercise planning intensity, placed the crew in fatigue and\or incite that tired crew to take off and conduct the mission, creating the context to the crash (see Reason model principle).
Hi Julien, the manufacturer’s recommendation were followed leading up to the Jervis Bay crash. ‘Should’ is a different recommendation to ‘must’.
Fatigue was a factor in the fatal crash, but there were plenty of policies, checks and tools in place to manage crew fatigue, and no evidence to suggest those rules weren’t followed.
That management could have done things differently to prevent a crash is a universal truth. These decisions are easier to see in hindsight. The IGADF inquiry will almost certainly make findings about this.
Dear Julien
I’m
Impressed by what I see , that’s the opinion I’ve got aswell.
Dear Julien
I was reading the comment late at night before bed, I agree with what you said.
I did raise this question to Kym Bergman a few weeks ago about the jervis bay accident.
And I’ll state it here.
If the compressor blade was deemed faulty by the manufacturer. And needed to be replaced. Wouldn’t it be under manufacturers warranty? , as in it wouldn’t be at any expense to the people operating the helicopter , in this case defence.
To me that looks like something went wrong. I also did read JB comments. And the wording should and must. Was there something else wrong with the engine? It looks suspiciously like that it was forgotten. One way or another,
Also I did read that the kiwis assisted with the investigation. As they operate the nh90 , not the mrh90. Which brings one question. As the kiwis do not use the top owl system that has come under severe criticism, is there any chance that they did use that top owl when they did assist ?, why didn’t we use one of the taipans that we were in the process of getting rid of?.
Helicopters are like cars – they don’t come with an unlimited warranty. You would have to check with the engine manufacturer Safran (if they wanted to go into those details) but I expect the warranty covered the engines for the first few years of operations – after that it’s up to the customer, in this case Army/CASG to cover those costs. I assume NZ uses a version of Top Owl – you need it for night flying.
Thanks Kym
From what I know , the version of top owl that we used wasn’t used by anyone else.
Germany used almost exactly the same HMSD software as Australia.
RNZAF did not use TopOwl, opting instead for binocular NVGs.
Many thanks for the clarification. Any idea why NZ didn’t use Top Owl? They often try to keep their configurations identical to Australia’s for support purposes.
I don’t know, but I assume it would have been about cost, complexity and training. Australia already operated TopOwl in Tiger, so there was less of a gap in those areas, as well as an extant support system for cutting helmet liners and servicing optics.
Many thanks. I also assumed that cost might have been a factor.
Dear JB, Keiran and Kym,
I also assume that cost contributed to the decision.
And, like JB suggests, it is certainly a sum of reasons :
Often, you want to optimize your capabilities by reducing impacts on their management.
If they had selected TopOwl for NH90, it would have been the only aircraft using such system.
You can easily consider the choice to use the same NVG than for MAKO and\or Seaprite : contracts management, training & qualification, crews conversions, acculturation…
But also for sustainability : each TopOwl is adjusted to adapt on a single head. That means you need one per pilot and need to procure new one (or ‘retrofit’ one from retired pilot ?), while NVG are generic.
EXCERPT FROM JERVIS BAY DITCHING REPORT SUMMARY
Sept 2024 Richard Marles tabled in Parliament the summary of the safety report into the 2023 Jervis Bay ditching.
Australian Army MRH-90 Taipan multirole helicopter, A40-025 Bushman 82, impacted water in the vicinity of Jervis Bay after it experienced a catastrophic BUT CONTAINED failure of its number one LEFT-HAND ENGINE.
“The flying pilot moved the aircraft forward slowly as the aircraft descended, with the RIGHT-HAND ENGINE automatically operating at its maximum available ONE ENGINE INOPERATIVE power rating.With the Automatic Flight Control System ‘Hover Mode’ still engaged and the RIGHT-HAND ENGINE AT MAXIMUM POWER the aircraft then rose into a low hover of approximately 23 feet.”
“The flying pilot in the right-hand cockpit seat, now aware the aircraft was in fact in a low hover, SHUT DOWN THE RIGHT-HAND ENGINE at a height of approximately 19 feet. This resulted in a high rate of descent, an impact force of 8G.”
“The flying pilot’s DECISION TO SHUT DOWN THE RIGHT-HAND ENGINE WAS NOT in accordance with standard emergency procedures.”
TRANSLATION – PILOT ERROR SHUT DOWN THE WRONG ENGINE & CAUSED DITCHING
“The failure of the HP 1 blade, which caused the catastrophic, BUT CONTAINED, engine failure, was the first of this type experienced by an Australian Defence Force (ADF) MRH-90 Taipan RTM-322 engine,” according to investigations outlined in the report.
“However, in 2017, as a result of several HP 1 failures across the global fleet, the original equipment manufacturer (OEM) issued a NH90 Service Bulletin recommending that operators of the RTM-322 engine should (vice being a mandatory requirement) replace HP 1 blades with modified blades.
“Hazard analysis of the OEM’S recommendations was conducted by the Navy and Army Aviation Military Air Operator (MAO) airworthiness and operations enterprise in consultation with the Defence Aviation Safety Authority (DASA).
“They determined that the ‘Design Safety Case’ for the MRH-90’s RTM-322 engine remained within the certification basis albeit with an extremely small increase in the likelihood of engine failures throughout the life-of-type of the MRH-90 fleet of aircraft.
“The Army Aviation MAO decided to modify MRH-90 engines as per the OEM’s recommendations during routine deeper-level maintenance programs. Neither engine installed in MRH-90 A40-025 was modified with new HP 1 blades.
TRANSLATION – ARMY’S HUBRISTIC FAILURE TO PROMPTLY FOLLOW OEM RECOMMENDATIONS RESULTED IN THE CATASTROPHIC BUT CONTAINED ENGINE FAILURE
CONCLUSION – BOTH REPORTS EFFECTIVELY VINDICATE TAIPAN AFTER UNDERLINING PROCEDURAL FAILURES BY ARMY
WHAT AUSTRALIA’S MINDLESS BLACK HAWK MAFIA REFUSE TO CONCEDE IS THE FACT THAT SUSTAINMENT FAILURES BY ARMY RESULTED IN MULTIPLE GROUNDINGS OF THE BLACK HAWK FLEET IN THE EARLY – MID 1990S, CAUSING THE LETHAL LACK OF AIRCREW CURRENCY THAT LED TO THE CATASTROPHIC 1996 MID AIR COLLISION – TRAGIC LOSS OF 18 SAS TROOPS & AIRCREW.
NOTHING KILLS ADF MEMBERS BETTER THAN ADF HUBRIS
https://australianaviation.com.au/2024/09/taipan-ditching-report-details-catastrophic-engine-failure/
The true causes of both the Nowra ditching and the Lindeman Island tragedy were very quickly known because of cockpit data recorders but Army – and the government – were perfectly happy to leave the implication that Taipans were unsafe festering away without the slightest bit of pushback or clarification.
And therefore leave a vacuum where doubt of what they are saying is true.
The one thing that does need to be stated and it’s not really is the damage to the adf prestige.
Forget for once that the taipan might or might not have been a bad helicopter, as a Australian, it’s a embarrassing cockup, as a taxpayer , I’m pissed off, as a person who has read a lot into defence force matters , this is one of the worst ,and if not the worst I’ve ever seen.
And this is in peacetime!
It’s was a brand new helicopter, yes there are teething troubles , but they should be sorted out, and if it was going off track or going bad ,why did it last so long. Where were the cheques and balances.
And then we have what Richard marles and pat conroy did, from my position , absolutely unprofessional.
Yes there were not the defence ministers that wanted to phase out the taipan and also adopted it in the first place, but the way and manner they went about it and told the public.
This has to be a major reason why no one wants to join the adf , and keep in mind that the defence minister hasn’t really addressed that issue. Instead we had pat conroy state “we must forgot about the taipan ,and move on”
But then we run the risk of forgetting what happened, and we are condemned to repeat it.
And we have done it in the past , keep in mind that before the taipan got adopted we had the super seasprite helicopter debacle, the French submarine deal.
Every time I see a nh90 on the news and tv, I got reminded of it , and with my work , I always do my best never to get into a bad situation like what I see.
Honestly there should be a federal enquiry into how it ended up like this, aka look into why it was chosen and how did it get off the rails ,but I fear that it will not be done.
Both the top brass , the politicians and bureaucrats will not want to make themselves look bad. It would be uncomfortable for them to do so.
So no matter which way you look, it’s a massive ,monumental cockup that no one will answer for , no one will learn for ,and most likely be forgotten.
After all , most of the stuff learnt is for a helicopter that is now buried or melted done.
The idea of an inquiry has been quashed by both the Government and the Coalition because they both have a vested interest in concealing what a mess this has been.
You are right Kim. It’s almost criminal the degree to which this program has been ignored by those who should be in charge.
If you wanted to split hairs, you could include the ANAO report of 2014, the nine annual updates to the projects of concern list released by the ANAO, the reports that placed both the acquisition and sustainment projects on the POC list in the first place, 17 Airworthiness Board reports, the eight formal reports recommending temporary cessation of flying operations and the reports justifying returning the fleet to fly again, comments criticising Taipan performance in every one of the 16 Defence Annual Reports since 2007, about a hundred briefs to the minister on Taipan underperformance, a couple of dozen grandiose performances in Senate estimates, approximately 6000 newspaper articles, three accident investigation reports and an IGADF inquiry.
But apart that, there has been absolute silence on the matter. It has been a total cover-up, probably enforced by the Black Hawk Mafia while they were white-anting the whole shebang with their secret illuminati spells.
It really has been a conspiracy of silence all round.
Thanks John – you fail to mention the suppressed Huston report of 2015/2016 which apparently found plenty of blame to go around, including Army’s management of the program. There was an earlier internal study that likewise was classified secret and buried – I’m struggling to recall the name of the person who conducted that one. All of the ANAO reports are based on data given to them by Defence. They were not objective evaluations of what was taking place.
The last time I checked, 14 countries are successfully operating Taipans / NH90 and apart from the situation with Norway, most are reasonably happy with what they are operating. To my knowledge, no one else has prematurely retired their entire fleet, broken them up, sold off a few spares for a pittance and then buried the remains.
At 4:37 pm Kym wrote: “but Army – and the government – were perfectly happy to leave the implication that Taipans were unsafe festering away without the slightest bit of pushback or clarification”
But at 11:00 am Kym also wrote: “Army Aviation people – and Simon Stuart – correctly stated that the helicopters were safe to operate.”
Regardless, safety, reputation and personal feelings had nothing to do with the decision to replace Taipan with UH-60M. Any ADF officer presenting anything other than hard evidence about availability, reliability and cost of ownership to justify transition to UH-60 was laughed out of the room.
And can we please stop fretting about the reputation of the aircraft? It had already been rejected by Norway, Belgium, Saudi Arabia, Sweden, Portugal and Egypt before Australia truncated its program, after operating it for 15 years.
JB. Different versions of NH90 and last I checked Belgium and Sweden still use NH90 as well as at least 10 other Countries.
I’m sure if Kieran writes to the minister and tells him he’s no longer joining the ADF, and if Mike Sierra writes in angry caps and mentions genocide, the government will be compelled to order another full inquiry. The fourth inquiry so far.
If we’re lucky, they’ll shoot a few senior officers and send all those naughty project managers to jail.
Then we can have an annual “sorry we said mean things about your favourite helicopter” parade and publicly whip all the technicians who only bothered working 50 hour weeks for a decade. Michael Alleyn can be the parade Marshall and make a speech about the mafia or whatever.
Send your submissions to: http://www.imcrossaboutahelicopter.gov.au.
Let’s get this movement started!!!!
I agree with JBs last statement in full.
Dear Kym
In regards to my last statement
I agreed to the comment at 4:02pm , not the most recent one , the moderator made it look like much later.
Anyway , I’m leaving this chat as I have got other things to do.
Dear Kym
I’m
Just saying this for clarification but your moderator put my last comment up on 10:22pm , I was referring to JBs comment he made at 4:34pm.
Someone needs to be accountable for what transpired.
Don’t worry Keiran, no-one thinks you want to flog anyone: this comments format is pretty clunky.
Kym made a comment at 4:34, not me. The comment I made at 4:02 about having a fourth inquiry was very sarcastic – I apologise if you didn’t get the joke.
As Kym said, there are 14 other customers left, so there will be plenty of NH90s to admire for decades to come. I hope you do well in whatever career you choose aside from the ADF.
John – aren’t you in the slightest bit curious about why other users have not had anything like the same number of problems as Taipan? I know it’s not the Army way, but it’s just possible we might learn something if we looked at some successful case studies rather than repeating the mantra that the problems were entirely with the helicopters. This is clearly not the case. They are still in series production and countries such as Italy, France and Germany will keep flying theirs until 2038 and probably beyond.
Dear Kym
Unfortunately the answer will be most likely based on what I see, helicoter gone , nothing to see here and move on. Not how on earth did we stuff it up
I don’t have to be curious. I spent nearly a decade seeing every nation’s monthly performance metrics, including hours achieved, aircraft serviceability and the reasons for aircraft non-availability.
With a few occasional bright spots (Belgian NFH, for example), every customer has struggled with low reliability and aircraft availability, higher than predicted maintenance demand, slow delivery rates for spare parts, and flying rates of effort well below that required by their program.
Users who appear to be doing well have usually elected to reduce system demand to match the output available. They then just fly what the aircraft allows them to and declare success, like the Qatari Navy, which flies just over one hour a week from its fleet of 12 aircraft.
Things might have improved in the last 5 years, but I haven’t seen any 12-ship air assaults with wave after wave of NH90s filling the air over Europe recently. Australia would regularly deploy 12 MRH90s to the field at once, while simultaneously keeping two embarked and having a further 2 or four on call for disaster relief. This was before we had added the demand for special forces support. That the French kept four aircraft from 60 deployed to Mali for years is creditable, but speaks to an entirely different set of requirements. The Italians did very well keeping five or 6 in Afghanistan – but they never tried to generate the mass that was demanded by the ADF.
The heat and steam went out of the Australian Tiger program when, after about 13 years of struggle (and bad press), Army stopped demanding what it thought it needed to support the joint force, and instead revised its requirements to match the ROE available – that is the global model for NH90. If the same method had been applied to MRH90, support to Special Forces would have almost totally consumed the fleet, leaving the other 80% of the Army and Navy with intermittent support at best.
Not a single global customer has achieved anything close to their predicted program output. To their credit, the RNZAF ran a highly optimised program, until unplanned operational demands upset their maintenance schedule, after which their output collapsed towards the global average of 30-40% availability and approximately 20 maintenance man hours per flying hour, just like everyone else.
Your belief that struggles with the NH90 program are unique to Australia is simply incorrect.
Thanks John. I don’t recall saying Australia’s problems were unique. What has been unique is the solution to retire, dismantle the fleet (in secret and at the fastest pace I have seen Defence move – ever), sell off some spares and bury the carcasses.
Dear JB,
regarding the fleet availability :
1st of all, the number of A/C deployed at a time is not necessarily relevant.
But actually, on this point, Finland is used to frequently place 7 or 8 NH90 in flight at the same period (and close to Russian border) as kind of conventional deterrence.
France has major exercises each year, for which lot of NH90 are participating.
You mention that all operators face to flying rates well below the requirement. That’s not true.
But I agree that, on global NH90, the annual FH are significantly below the sum of requirements.
Mainly due to spares shortages I would say, to say it short. (and, IMO, lack from manufacturers & NHI to tackle In-Service Support issues and invest on spares availability).
Thanks for that additional information. I was wondering how the Finns in particular were doing.
Thanks Kieran, because of your loyalty you can have first go flogging the technicians.
But make sure you stretch first; we don’t want you getting injured.
Cheers Kym.
I reckon I have been engaging with you here for about 18 months now.
In that time we’ve moved from accusations that a conspiracy of malevolent Army idiots deliberately ruined the prospects of the world’s best aircraft, to a concern that they were disposed of with inappropriate haste. We covered lots of other ground, but that feels like the general narrative arc.
People are angry we didn’t donate them to Ukraine. (Although they’d probably still be in a warehouse in Poland with our Abrams if we had). Perhaps the Ukrainians could have made them work, perhaps – in time – achieving 40% or 45% availability like everyone else.
But back in 2022/3, we were told by a Ukrainian delegation that “thousands of lives” were in the balance due to a lack of AME aircraft, specifically because of a limited ability to operate at night. What has the UKRAF done since then to fill that critical capability gap? There were plenty of options available other than MRH90.
If, as I strongly suspect, the answer is “nothing”, maybe we can retire our outrage over the Ukraine question as well.
Thank you for being civil and open to these posts. Hopefully you can forgive my sarcasm towards some of your other contributors.
Thanks John – the issue of Ukraine is a separate one and the most I can say about that is it’s a technically advanced nation that is capable of innovation and adaptation, as the recent drone attacks on Russia’s strategic bomber fleet have just demonstrated. I share your suspicion that the donated Abrams are heading for a warehouse somewhere – but that’s not because the Ukrainians can’t operate them but because they would only last 5 minutes if they came within 10km of the front because they would be immediately the target of swarming Russian drones using top down attacks.
Back to Taipans – and now an outrageous attempt to deflect you – I also remember the tale of the Super Seasprites. The very quick summary is that the RAN program was cancelled in 2008 for a cumulative loss of $2 billion. The 11 helicopters were returned to OEM Kaman and the Australian-specific software features were removed – basically increasing the crew from 2 to back to the original 3. New Zealand bought them for next to nothing and has been operating them successfully ever since, and they are now about to be retired. I raise this to indicate I’ve had some reservations about Australian military rotary wing issues for some time.
I very much appreciate your contributions and insights. Don’t worry about occasionally getting snippy – it’s a topic on which there are strong feelings, including with me. But here’s another thought: rather than scrap all 45 Taipans, why not have cannibalised a few of them to keep the remaining fleet operating? I often run into the “that’s not the way we do things” argument and think maybe it’s worth looking at doing some things differently.
Hi Kym,
I am no expert on Seasprite. The one briefing I attended outlined the problems the project team were having integrating a highly advanced weapons management system into the aircraft. These problems were fixable given more time and resources. But in the meantime, the very reason for procuring the aircraft – acquisition of a smaller ship that couldn’t accommodate Sea Hawk – was cancelled. So the decision was made to terminate the Seasprite program rather than continue to invest in an aircraft that no longer had an operational reason to exist, to the benefit of the RNZN.
Ref: maintaining a small fleet of Taipans; that comes down to people. Army Aviation operates with less than a third of RAAF’s manpower for each combat aircraft fielded. There are no spare aviators.
The underlying engineering and sustainment effort required to run a fleet of 12 or 6 Taipans is not much different to that required for a fleet of 45. Add to that the requirement for an MRH90 training system, and you would need a significant workforce that could only be generated at the expense of Apache, Chinook or UAS ops.
If there was some contingency requiring an additional sqn of troop lift, it would be far easier to conduct a second rapid acquisition or lease UH-60s from the US Army’s fleet of 3000-ish. We could train our aviators at Fort Novosel, and adjust extant sustainment arrangements using the same staff who are already managing the current Australian fleet of UH-60M.
In short, it would be much more costly in terms of time, money and staff to maintain a small fleet of MRH90s compared to surging UH-60M capacity if required. Trained engineers, maintainers and aircrew would be the critical resource. They generally can’t be split between aircraft types, and some take 15 years to develop.
On the subject of the MRH90 I have to agree with JB, to a point. The largest draw back is, as JB rightly points out, is manpower. This problem is widespread throughout the ADF, it would be great to have Taipans and Tigers as well as Blackhawks and Apaches but the reality is we don’t have the capacity, or money, to field different types of Helicopters with specific operational benefits but that basically do the same thing. Taipans are far superior ( in my opinion) to Blackhawks (as the Tiger is far superior to the Apache, in the role of Reconnaissance Helicopters, which is what Army Aviation asked for. ) Unfortunately( again in my opinion) the best Anti Submarine Helicopter for the R.A.N. is the MH-60R Seahawk, so it makes sense to utilise an airframe that has multiple types. Logistically it’s a nightmare having to have different spares and training programs for a multitude of Types. The same is true across the ADF, every Soldier in logistics was rooting for the Lynx to win Land 400, The Seasprite was a totally different story. It was sourced to be embarked on the JPV (Sea1180) which was cancelled, so there was no reason to retain it , again one to many airframes to operate.
As an aside, a few days ago I was on board a German Navy F125 frigate and they – apparently along with all of their colleagues in the Bundesmarine – are enthusiastically looking forward to deliveries of NH90 NFH (NATO Frigate Helicopter). This is the ASW variant of the NH90 / Taipan helicopter. They variously described it as “superb”, “huge capability boost”, “by far the best in its class.” No negatives at all. Having said that, the program is years late due to very complex system integration issues, just like many other 5th generation platforms – such as F-35s. But what would the Germans know about military equipment?
Hi Michael,
Your post about multiple types from 09:09 is exactly what was called for in Project AIR 9000 Ph1, the Helicopter Strategic Master Plan, published in 2000.
And thanks for the recall on SEA 1180 – I would never have remembered that.
Feb 1989 RAAF operation of Black Hawks was transferred to Army’s 5 Avn Regt.
By 1994 after 5 years with Army, Black Hawk availability had plummeted with aircraft lined up exposed to weather without engines, blades, gearboxes and other vital parts. It took the personal intervention of the Chief of the Air Force and Army on a visit to 5 Avn Regt to begin solving the problems to get aircraft back in the air.
While Army/RAAF cost disputes over repairing components were grounding aircraft, another problem was coming to light which impacted the fleet even longer. Black Hawk’s limited range (less than half of Taipan’s) and Australia’s vast distances meant external auxiliary fuel tanks – support pylons were needed more often than anticipated. Components on the Black Hawk were time lifed according to the usage spectrum and consequently a number of components had their life reduced, some requiring considerable lead time for acquisition.
This problem also contributed to the high rate of structural cracking that occurred in the Australian fleet compared to American aircraft and significantly impacted the availability of Australian Black Hawks for many years.
Questions regarding command and management of Army Aviation alongside support provided by RAAF under the Single Service Logistic Management arrangements, saw a joint Army/Airforce team set up in 1995 to examine the many problems. The result was establishment of Headquarters Aviation Support Group which asked for Sikorsky’s help to bolster maintenance personnel with contractors to improve the flow of repair parts, and reduce cannibalisation. After 7 years in Army service, Black Hawk availability slowly began to show signs of recovery.
Despite their introduction to Army service as ‘Battlefield Helicopters’, Australia’s Black Hawks were never deployed to Afghanistan as they lacked armour and self defence systems.
The first 16 years of Army’s hubristic – incompetent management of Black Hawk operations resulted in 21 deaths and 5 aircraft lost speaks volumes compared to the 4 lives – 1 aircraft lost after 16 years of similarly hubristic – incompetent management of Taipan.
Yet APDR’s resident anti Taipan troll addicted to sniping these threads (now seeking to write off his vitriol as sarcasm ) fails to comprehend that simply ignoring the abundance of data exposing Army’s Black Hawk paralysis ( like that posted above and elsewhere ) does not constitute evidence based debate much less prove Black Hawk’s supremacy over Taipan. No amount botty kissing the editor changes the superior survival technology Taipan delivered the ten on board during a night time 8G impact with Jervis Bay, compared to the Black Hawk that dragged its pilot and an SAS trooper with it to the bottom of the crystal clear seas off Fiji in broad daylight…RIP…Lest We Forget.
Sarcasm: that was another great post Mike! well done!
Vitriol: I hope your wife is happy with whichever Army Aviator she ran off with.
Thanks for confirming yet again the vacuous nature of your unsolicited opinions KB. Interesting that such infantile ad hominem is deemed relevant much less worthy of print re the proven survival fundamentals of each aircraft.
I’m not sure which unsolicited opinions of mine you are referring to but I’ll reluctantly let this through because I’m never beyond criticism.
apologies for typo Kym, reply was clearly responding to JB’s diatribe
Well please knock it off – in future I’m going to block any of this childish sniping from this site, no matter who it’s coming from.
Obvious typos aside, the conduct permitted in this thread has seen it degenerate into farce. The Black Hawk loss in Fiji and Taipan ditching over Jervis Bay proved beyond doubt Taipan’s design and flotation gear vastly improves occupants chances of survival should unplanned events occur during littoral operations. I assumed improving the chances of ADF members survival (coupled with exploiting superior range, speed and payload) would’ve been the number one priority for Australian taxpayers invested in such operations. Based on the direction this thread has taken, clearly I was wrong.
Thanks Mike – you are correct, the far superior safety features of the NH90 / Taipan family are hardly ever mentioned.
Dear Kym Bergmann
I can fill in some more details about the super seasprite saga that struck the royal Australian navy in the early 2000s. But before I do that , I do need to clarify a couple of points.
First dear JB, I am not a blind paid up social media bot, and I do take offence of your sarcastic comments you said earlier.
I did apologies for some comments that might cause offence in an earlier discussion.
I work hard in my job ,and I do maintain one thing , been honest. And I am not privy to any defence stuff , I am and most likely remain be an outsider of the adf or government. I try to keep a non biased opinion as much as possible, I like to be as independently minded as possible , a sexy looking helicopter doesn’t matter that much if it doesn’t perform what it says on the tin. Besides my favourite helicopter is the puma and sea stallion series.
And I have only stated my opinion, as well as yours, which I respect.
Second , I do agree with Michael Allen comments about a shared platform.
When the taipan was selected in 2007 , it did make more sense to purchase blackhawks , as we had them , crews were familiar with them etc. I believe that the main reason the taipan was chosen was because they could be made here. Which I did debunk as the Blackhawk’s were made under licence by de haviland Canada in Australia.
I also did state that Poland build blackhawks under licence so I do see no reason why we could have done the same.
That is also why I suggested that when the navy phased out the taipans for the navy, which were in use for the Canberra LST, the cost of running the taipans in the army shot up.
One other question that I was thinking about , if the top owl was similar to the arh Tigre , why wasn’t there any issues with it made public while the issue with the taipans top owl was made public?
In regards to sending them to Ukraine, the Ukrainian ambassador stated that we would do our assessment on how safe the taipan was.
In regards to the super seasprite. I know a former naval officer who was involved with the program.
For the record , the super seasprite was a helicopter for a new corvette that we were planning to make , it was either the super seasprite and the lynx, and we choose the super seasprite. Then the corvette got cancelled, and the super seasprite was then meant for the Anzac class frigate.
He told me that the program failed because of the bureaucrats saying that they wanted this ,they would reply ,no you couldn’t and it would go back and forth, and it wouldn’t work.
In the end, we didn’t allow them to be certified for full service and we spent from memory about 300 million dollars, while the New Zealanders spent 56 million and they still have them in service.
In fact from what he said , the biggest problem was installing a night vision system that the super seasprite wasn’t able to fit, or just didn’t work.
Also add to that I did have a conversation with a contractor on Friday that used to work for defence , and the consistent story was that adf tended to complicate stuff. Which I have heard before with talking to other people
There have been historical examples of planes that got bad reputations for unreliability that turned out to be, wasn’t due to the plane.
For example , the Napier sabre engine used for the hawker typhoon had a terrible reputation and nearly killed off the typhoon ,and yes there was defects during manufacturing. But the main one was ground crews not maintaining the engine according to specs, aka using the wrong lubrication oil, and not turning the engine over as specified.
That’s one example of how can a plane or platform can get a bad reputations which was not entirely the platforms fault.
I do need to reiterate that no platform is perfect , the nh90 ,and the mrh90 is a relatively new platform that would ,despite the best effects would have encountered issues, also known as teething problems or growing pains. And crews and mechanics need to get husbanded to their new kit.
I have read and heard about the seats been not rated for a fully combat soldier , or the ramp buckling. But one would expect that these would be sorted out over time.
And I’ll admit maybe the taipan wasn’t the best platform for special forces.
But like I said earlier ,if the helicopter was so bad, then why did it last for so long, aka why wasn’t it sorted out or not even put into service like what happened to the super seasprite.
There have been cases of defence forces being conned buying or purchase platforms that the test platform gave good performance while the production ones didn’t. The most noticeable example is the bell p39 aerocobra purchase under lend lease for the raf.
The fact is that unfortunately, we have the words of the defence minister Richard marles and Pat Conroy which do not add up with what has also been shown , and not just from Kym bergmann but also 60mins. And the statement that was produced on the show by NH industries, which let the New Zealanders resume flying the nh90 a week after the accident, the statement stating that there was nothing mechanical mechanically wrong with the airframe.
From my experience and perspective, what ever your opinion is , the adf and army have done an almighty cockup, no other way of putting it.
And my instinct tells me that the army, and adf are not been honest with the public.
You have the testimonies in the enquiry of people involved with the igadf enquiry, that make for unsettling reading.
And consistent narratives, of crews doing paperwork and not getting much time in the air, or crews not feeling confident with the platform.
And then of course you have the top owl thing as well, which is a big deal if what the test pilot said is true.
The biggest issue for me is that would the adf or the army after all this, would Learn from this almighty cockup.
From an outsider perspective, they have stated they have done certain things, but only time will tell.
This stuff shouldn’t be happening , and the sad thing is that it has resulted in the loss of four personnel , whose families have been shattered , and their grief is beyond comprehension.
And I’ll leave the conversation.
Dear Kieran – than you very much for all of the additional information. This is possibly the longest post I have seen and I admire your enthusiasm and your interest.
I can add in a couple of extra details regarding Super Seasprites. Fundamentally the account you heard is highly accurate. The project had its genesis in the early 1990s when Australia and Malaysia were considering the joint build of OPVs. Even at the time it seemed a bit flaky and after a year or two Malaysia decided to go their own way. The Seasprites were to equip those OPVs and as soon as Malaysia pulled out the entire thing should have been dropped.
However, the helicopters achieved a certain zombie like status lurching on destined for the Anzacs. There may well have been night vision issues but the heart of the problem was the RAN decision to cut the crew from 3 to 2. In this they were assisted by DSTO, who in turn had been convinced by a now defunct US company (maybe Litton) that everything could be done via software. This led to a number of performance issues – by far the most serious was that the flight control software would randomly and suddenly push the nose of the helicopter down. Whoa! As I am sure pilots like JB will confirm, that’s absolutely the last thing you want.
Defence / RAN stumbled on for years trying to come up with software fixes. Each new software release made improvements, but the basic problem remained – and so the project was finally terminated.
Apart from the fact that the acquisition should not have lasted beyond about 1995, if RAN had reverted to the original 3 crew system (as the RNZN did) everything would have been fine.
Thanks kym Bergman
He was deeply involved with it , what I recounted was a conversation about a few months ago , and I do remember the four corners doco a few years ago,
Honestly if they chose the lynx , they would have had a far better platform because that was a more modern design ,while the super seasprite was a 1960s helicopter retrofitted.
I brought those historical examples up to demonstrate that not everything is black and white with any defence force program.
I do know one person who had some experience with the taipan , but he was soldier who had a ride in it, and he said that it was a nice helicopter.
Now in saying that ,he was a soldier having a ride , he might have liked the taipan as it might have been more comfortable than the Blackhawk. But he was only a passenger.
And this was in the early stages of the taipan.
Apart from that , I cannot add anymore to the discussion.
Hi Kieran,
I’ve already apologised for any offence I may have caused with what I still think was a pretty funny series of posts, but I’ll apologise again. Sorry.
What I’ll say in response is that you, Mike Sierra, Michael Alleyn, and some others talk about ‘the Army’ as if it is a borg-like block of mindless drones, and you talk about ‘the reputation of the MRH90’ as if there is such a thing, and as if it matters. All of you are protective of your own feelings and opinions, but you don’t seem to care about the thousands of people I worked with trying to make MRH90 a success.
Firstly, I have been open about my extensive involvement with the program. When I make statements about what did and didn’t happen, and why, that is based on my personal experience – not on a conversation I had with someone once, or a news report I read.
Secondly, Army, Industry and Navy were in partnership. Everyone tried as hard as they could. We peaked in 2017, and after we realised that performance wasn’t sustainable, we made a choice. What we learned is that when you identify a system won’t deliver what you need from it, you should terminate the program as soon as possible.
Thirdly, it is not a new helicopter. 1990 was 35 years ago. There are pilots in the ADF who weren’t born when the minister approved AIR 9000 Ph2. I watched the first two MRH90s land in Australia in December 2007. The decision to transition to UH-60M was based on 15 years of experience and an exhaustive assessment of the likelihood of whether the MRH90 would ever deliver what the ADF needs.
I totally agree with you – nothing is black and white. If MRH90 delivered more hours, and was available in greater numbers, we would still be operating it, regardless of the maintenance burden. If Navy had selected it instead of MH-60R, we would also probably still be operating it. And if Army Aviation had 1000 more people, we never would have had to consider dropping it in the first place.
JB – I’ll add in (for what it’s worth) that I don’t doubt the sincerity of everyone who tried to make it work. There’s not a lot of point re-litigating everything but no matter how enthusiastic people are the reality is that civilian contractors are about twice as productive as ADF members because they don’t have all the additional demands on their time as service people do. Reducing the number of bases would also have been a big help – as is now taking place for the UH-60M. Btw, deliveries of those seems to have slowed and I wonder when they will receive the promised weather radars?
Another area that has always interested me – and it’s purely speculative and admittedly comes form people with more of a RAAF or RAN background – is that Army (another generalisation) simply were not ready to support an advanced 5th generation platform.
Dear JB
understood and fair comment.
Friends have told me not to slam a whole organisation, which is very easy to do.
Yes there are genuinely good people in the adf and army. But there is no way in hell I would trust a bureaucrat involved in defence or the defence minister after all of what has transpired.
Thanks Kym,
your 1st paragraph – agreed. No idea about wx radars but deliveries are on schedule.
2nd paragraph, I don’t know what ‘5th generation’ means for a helicopter. Is it FBW and carbon composites? Retractable undercarriage and a weather radar? Whatever it is, it’s not clear to me why such a helicopter should demand more, and more advanced maintenance than its predecessor. F-15 and F-16 were designed from the outset to be easier to maintain with fewer technicians than F-106 and F-4. F-35, believe it or not, was specifically designed to be easier to maintain than F-15 and F-18.
But I’d make three more pertinent points about whether Army was ready to maintain MRH90.
First, every single meeting, publicity blurb and technical assessment during acquisition indicated that the NH90 would be easier to maintain, and would require less maintenance overall compared to S-70L. That was one reason it was selected in the first place.
Second, Airbus are undeniably more efficient than Army technicians, but they still had to do just as much maintenance. Maybe this was because of Army’s inefficient maintenance policies. Maybe it was because Navy was so stubborn about how and when they wanted the aircraft on line. But it was still a lot of maintenance.
Third – If Army couldn’t maintain MRH90 because of some sort of institutional deficiency, wouldn’t that just make the decision to transition to something they can operate more compelling? I mean, Army still needs the Aviation support it needs, right? If Army Aviation can’t operate MRH90, but can operate UH-60M, why not just be pragmatic?
The use of 5th gen is imprecise. I’ve taken it to mean a fully digital platform, but others have different definitions.
Your third point makes sense – except it’s costing taxpayers $3 billion to do so. Even a fraction of that would have gone a long way to addressing the issues.
When I started digging into this – which seems like a lifetime ago – looking at CAMM2 and various other support databases trying to make sense of the situation, an old Army hand summarised the situation for me like this: “Taipan is the equivalent of a fancy top of the line European SUV – but all Army wanted was an old Holden ute where you could just throw the tools in the back and drive away.” After everything I have learnt, that remains the best summary.
You know Army Aviation doesn’t help it’s cause with the Australian taxpayers who collectively are their employer! Today’s findings regarding the 2021 bushfire caused by a piss stop of an MRH-90 in Canberra that caused a 92,000 hectare bushfire is utterly beyond belief. One would expect Army Aviation to be a professional organisation but all I see in this report is total incompetence, arrogance and a substantial disregard to the safety of the community. I apologise if I offend anyone with that comment but Australian Taxpayers deserve better. Pity they couldn’t bury this report with the $3 billion of tax payer’s helicopters they buried.
Your comments reflect exactly my own views. I’m sure there are some fine individuals within the organisation, but the overall culture is appalling. And the ADF wonders why they have difficulty recruiting smart young people.
Dear Kym Bergmann
I left the chat earlier due to other reasons, and I think I don’t need to rejoin after this.
First I had the chance to go through an enquiry by the senate defence Comission , this was one headed by David Fawcett , who put the 18min video on YouTube.
It looked like to me that it was both pat conroy and Richard marles who did make a comment that the taipan were unsafe. And that was stricken off the record at the enquiry.
Also both Jeremy king and Simon Stuart told their opinion on the taipan and why it wouldn’t be a good choice to give to Ukraine, which was that the adf did their own assessment and that would be as a medivac chopper. And that also which has been stated by both Jeremy king and JB of the good record back in 2017.
David Fawcett used both the good record of the New Zealanders and the review by the Norwegian government to make a case that the Ukrainians with a centralised European supply system could have made the taipan more viable than what the Australian army was suggesting. Please note that it was what the Ukrainian were proposing.
It should be worth noting that they (Jeremy king and Simon Stuart) would say it would be more expensive to operate, please note that the Ukrainians are at war, they could get it to work if they set their mind to it.
I do need to state that if the Ukrainians had got them , I’m pretty sure they could sign a waiver and be very much happy to do so. In fact they would have used their heavy lift Antonov’s to bring them over.
I also need to state that I do not believe in the black hawk mafia theory that has been stated ,however you have to keep in mind that the Blackhawk didn’t have a perfect track record either. As there was one case of one doing an emergency landing on a public field. ( non pilot error incidents only)
I do have a few questions that I would like to list ,and if Kym or anyone else able to answer ,please go ahead.
1. Was their any lessons or rules put in place after the super seapsrite saga to try and avoid a debacle of something similar happening again?
2. Did the Australian army consult with the other operators to try and improve operating them?,
3. Was there any breach of contract penalties for failing to meet performance, or something of the sort for the mrh 90?
One last thing, and this is to JB. As I feel I need to clarify what I meant earlier.
Yes there’re decent men ,and woman serving in the defence force, and I know that.
However what troubles me a lot with the taipan stuff is the actual witness testimonies of the enquiry, that is hard to ignore, and to overlook ,as I have had painful experiences in my line if work.
I have no trust for Richard marles or pat Conroy for what they said, and I do believe that some people need to be held accountable.
Anyway I wish I could read through the report and give my thought on it ,but I’ve got no time for it.
Kym wish you have a good day otherwise.
The answer to the first 2 questions is: no & no. The ADF / Defence never, ever learn from their procurement disasters – and no one is ever held to account – and therefore the system will never improve. As for consulting with other operators – almost certainly not. I have never detected even the slightest interest on the part of Army in how other countries – for example New Zealand – have managed to operate their fleets much more successfully than Australia. I have only once been able to speak directly with MAJGEN Jeremy King – and that was by accident – and when I asked about NZ and their MRH90s his answer was “New Zealand is a wonderful country and they do things differently.” That was the totality of his contribution, which I assume reflected the full extent of both his knowledge and his interest.
Dear Kym Bergman
Thanks for answering, have a good day otherwise.
Dear Kym Bergmann
I had a quick read through the report, I will admit that It was a lot to go through.
Honestly I would want to hold off until the enquiry report comes out.
But from what I am reading ,and interpreting, this accident could have happened to any helicopter in the exact same circumstances, according to what they state,
whether it was a Blackhawk , a taipan , a chinook or a sea king.
Also in relation to the note about the top owl issue , unlikely doesn’t really rule out the issue with it , also keep in mind that with low flying and high speed, any lag time or minor errors can be fatal, also if you suspect it was faulty , you wouldn’t trust it.
I also did read the report about the grass fire mentioned in another comment, that is an unfortunate accident ,and it would be easy for some people to make that mistake.
but I also did some research into the Townsville Blackhawk midair Collision back in 1996.
The Blackhawk did have some issues when entering service ,namely lack of spare parts and lack of availability, and a lot of pilots not having enough experience due to lack of flying time.
This was raised in the enquiry into that incident.
And this is the thing, that was an accident nearly thirty years ago!
I feel really sorry for the families of the relatives of the lost ones ,because to me, this could have been avoided.
I want to state that I have been thinking about how the taipan ran foul of the adf, as in the announcement of them been retired. and I think that has to do with AUKUS.
Put simply the money that could have been needed to buy spare parts was set aside for an ambitious weapon system that was high stakes, and now with recent events, a high risk of not going ahead.
I do want to reiterate this bit , the newer Blackhawk when the replacement for the older one was needed , was a better choice for the army as it was a workhorse and that maintenance crews and mechanics had over twenty years experience under their belts, and it would have been easier ,simpler and cheaper, as crews already were very familiar with it. I do agree with that.
But the Blackhawk had it issues , teething problems in service , a few doing emergency landings and the collision in Townsville. But eventually it made itself a reliable and solid platform, through hard bitter lessons.
The taipan in adf service ,when you look at accidents or incidents, actually has a good safety record, but the lessons learnt from the older Blackhawk beginnings seemed to be forgotten.
And with what was raised at the enquiry, honestly the newer blackhawks could have been in a similar situation.
And also ,one last thing , one guy commented that it would deter many people from joining the adf.
Yes it would, and it has.
And this I can say to JB, it doesn’t really matter what he says , I am a member of the Australian public ,and we have all taken notes about what has happened.
The public perception of the adf is not good at all, pat Conroy attitude when he made a comment last year of “ we must forgot about the taipan and put it all behind us”.
If what job has said is true , the adf has made a poor attempt at convincing the public. People do not forgot these things easily.
I am not trying to attack the adf , but they do need to rebuild the trust between the public and the adf.
That’s all I can add for now
Hi Keiran – thank you for all your extra research. Your work is very much appreciated. If I can summarise your analysis – all new platforms have issues with being introduced into service. At the risk of upsetting JB – whose contributions are very welcome because of his detailed knowledge of events – no service other than the Australian Army has wilfully and with totally unprecedented speed destroyed their fleet of helicopters. I cannot express just how angry this disgusting episode makes me feel.
Dear Kym
You are not the only one.
Dear Kym Bergmann
The question that needs to be asked is why did they do that?, aka why did they dispose the taipans in such a manner and so quickly, risking a loss of capability as the Blackhawks had not arrived in proficient numbers ,and that we had to rent out Augusta Westland AW139 (I might be wrong with the designation) to fill the gap.
And also why were they not allowed to go to Ukraine?, and yes that does make me feel angry.
Btw I watched Malcom Robert’s YouTube video asking Simon Stuart about that.
This will be the last comment I’ll leave.
I can’t answer those questions because I have spent the last couple of years unsuccessfully trying to find out.
Dear Kym Bergmann
Thanks for the reply , I do not need to post anymore.
I wasn’t expecting you would know anyway ,thanks for trying.
I do have my suspicions though.
Dear Kym Bergman
I am just letting you know thanks for the correspondence over the taipan stuff over the last few months.
I have been busy with other things and had nothing else to contribute to it any further.
But I can now contribute as there has been a few developments and also that I can put the idea of joining the adf to bed , as in never want to think about it again , and never will.
I will say this , there were many factors on why ,but the taipan was the one main reason why.
I can say with confidence what I do for work , I have spent 16 years in the building industry, working for the same company and a few years as a whs officer.
I have done risk assessment , cert 4 in whs and did start the diploma.
But I have spent years researching and studying accidents and incidents in areas of interests.
So with that said , what I can I say about the taipan stuff that I haven’t already.
I don’t have too.
One of my last posts I stated that the army either have not learnt or forgotten the hard lessons from the Townsville collision where two Blackhawks collided killing 20, and it turns out that I wasn’t the only one that made that conclusion.
There was a helicopter magazine that I read that read the report above and made the exact same conclusion, that it didn’t address the armies bad culture, and that it was a ongoing issue well before the crash in 2023.
So that is true, there is a bad culture when it comes to army aviation.
There’s more though,
You had the news that com care wasn’t going to prosecute anyone about the taipan crash, we then had a vote lead by one nations senator Malcolm Robert’s asking that Comcare unseal the reasons why not, it passed and they did.
I do need to note that the families of the victims were told by Comcare that no one was going to be prosecuted a few days before the second anniversary of the crash , which is frankly disgusting behaviour.
Anyway , Comcare did indeed find that army aviation was in breach of whs legislation twice!, first was fatigue management and the second was with the topowl.
The helicopter magazine article I read concluded that there was no written evidence that a risk assessment was done when the top owl system was upgraded.
As the saying goes history doesn’t repeat ,but it often rhymes.
For the record , I am not a Malcolm Robert’s supporter , but even a blind pig can find an acorn once in a while.
He then pressed a vote to release the defence full report that hasn’t been realised, both sides voted it down.
Then you also had the comedian Jim Jefferies and rad Hadley accusing the adf of doing a coverup.
So far , that is all that has happened.
But for my personal opinion.
The adf can have its proud traditions and heritage and can frankly shove it up its arse, because for me , there is no point of joining a adf that practices what it says but doesn’t preach it.
Proud heritage and traditions count for nothing in a coverup.
I have read the report in full , and there is no other way of saying this but for any defence force , this is the most digusting and atrocious thing I have ever read any defence force do.
I can clearly see that there is no future for me in the adf at all, as my attitudes and beliefs are not what the adf needs, and I feel betrayed by that.
I never believed jb comments because my experience tells me otherwise.
Someone did ask me recently , if the adf said they would change their attitudes and clean up bad culture , would I join, I would still say no. Because it will never happen.
The taipan thing could be argued is just a adf or an army thing , no I think it is much worse than that and a dangerous precedent.
First is that the mistakes have been repeated from the fallout of the Townsville crash , second is the classical gov move of nothing to see here and move on!, that is not acknowledging that they made mistakes and willing to learn from them, that is covering a bureaucrats ass to make him less bad, if people did their job correctly, it wouldn’t be a problem.
The biggest problem is that the government, adf bureaucrats and top brass in all branches have in some ways being involved in the suppressing of the truth.
And that is what I would say a normalisation of deviating from the rules.
If I was in the adf as an officer, I would not tolerate the stuff that has happened.
But I am not involved in the adf, and I would love to rip Richard marles and pat Conroy to shreds, as in fully humiliate them at a press briefing for what they have done.
And the one last final thing before signing off for good , in regards to the accusations of Jim jefferies and rad Hadley claiming that the adf is doing a coverup.
Here is the thing , I know contacts who know friends that have confirmed exactly what I have suspected all along.
And as I am not joining the adf at all, I can say that I believe what ray Hadley and Jim jefferies because I know something they don’t.
With that said , as I no longer interested with adf stuff at all, and that will be the only time I will show my passion of debating certain things , as the adf doesn’t like people like me , and won’t be listened too.
Have a good day Kim
Keiran Allcott
Hello Kieran – nice to hear from you and thank you for your further points. You raise a number of important subjects, especially about ADF culture – which is a very broad theme. This is something that I struggle with as well, having watched an organisation that used to be reasonably open and helpful morph into something that is almost unrecognisably hostile and suspicious – with one or two rare exceptions. This shows up in ongoing problems with recruitment, with figures showing that of people who have applied to join the ADF, around 50% don’t complete the process – in other words, once they have had a closer look at what they are getting themselves into, they change their minds. A difficult problem to quickly fix. The entire Taipan helicopter experience is an illustration of a broader problem.
Dear Kym Bergmann
Thanks for the reply
I might have overstepped my rhetoric but you also get a sense of how pissed off I was with the taipan stuff.
anyway , have a good day