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From the MoD:

In a move which is predicted to revolutionise RAF flying training, 4 (Reserve) Squadron, based at RAF Valley, is gearing up for its first student course in April 2012.

Two RAF Hawk T2 aircraft pictured during a flight over North Wales. Picture: Corporal Paul Oldfield RAF, Crown Copyright/MOD 2010

Two RAF Hawk T2 aircraft pictured during a flight over North Wales [Picture: Corporal Paul Oldfield RAF, Crown Copyright/MOD 2010] Through a combination of synthetic training and 28 Hawk T2 aircraft, the training syllabus which now awaits the first students is considered to be world-leading:

“I’ve been to Australia and the USA and seen how they train fast jet pilots and in my view we’ve leapfrogged them,” said Squadron Leader Rob Caine, Officer Commanding Staff Training and Standards.

“This is principally because of the Operational Capability 2 software in the jet which turns a very capable digital Hawk into a front line aircraft emulator, both air-to-air and air-to-ground.”

Students come to the North Wales station straight from flying the Tucano at RAF Linton-on-Ouse:

“On arrival each student is given a laptop and wherever they go on station they can plug it in and get whatever they need – briefings, debriefs, the flying programme, student study devices etc,” explained Flight Lieutenant Stefan Brown, an instructor on 4 (Reserve) Squadron.

During six weeks of ground school students will progress using a variety of training aids, including a full-motion simulator, and will practise everything they can expect to encounter in the air before getting airborne. Thereafter, four or five flights are undertaken with an instructor before the first solo:

“The aim of the syllabus is to produce a multi-role single jet pilot and we can take pilots faster and further than ever before,” explained Sqn Ldr Caine.

“We are now able to train the tactics and procedures of the front line here, including introductions into the classified planning aspects. As a result the standard [of graduating students] should be higher in terms of capability and readiness.”

Continue reading New training pushes RAF pilots faster and further

The much-delayed Nimrod aircraft cost £3.4bn to develop before it was scrapped to save an estimated £1.9bn in running costs over 10 years. Photograph: Christopher Furlong/Getty Images

Britain’s 15 biggest defence projects are expected to cost £6bn more than first estimated and will be delayed by a combined total of 26 years, a parliamentary watchdog reports today.

Too often the taxpayer has had to pick up the bill for the Ministry of Defence underestimating the risks involved in procuring complex weapons systems, the Commons public accounts committee (PAC) says.

The committee identifies three large projects bedevilled by long delays and huge overspend. These include the repeatedly delayed Nimrod maritime patrol aircraft, upon which £3.4bn was spent before it was scrapped, to save an estimated £1.9bn in running costs over the next 10 years.

The MoD will incur further costs from cancelling contracts and substituting alternative capabilities. The committee has asked the National Audit Office to investigate the decision to scrap Nimrod aircraft as well as all of Britain’s Harrier jump-jets.

Read more on the Guardian Website

Consultants were paid £1.1 million to help axe Britain’s fleet of Harrier jump jets and then sell them to America, it emerged today.

The Ministry of Defence was criticised for a “ludicrous waste” of money on outside help, at a time when thousands of troops are being cut.

MPs said it was “extraordinary” that private firms were profiting from helping to slash the defence budget, arguing the job could be done by the department’s own staff. The 74 Harriers were retired eight years early as part of 2010′s defence review. But last year 72 were sold to the US military, who compared them to cars with just 15,000 miles on the clock.

The £1.1 million would pay the annual salaries of 58 entry-level soldiers. The expenditure was revealed only days after the MoD announced that 4,200 troops would be axed this year.

Shadow defence secretary Jim Murphy argued the cash could be better spent protecting jobs or equipment, adding: “People will find it extraordinary that private consultants are being paid to help slash the defence budget.

“Ministers must explain why others are profiting from decisions which have seen thousands made redundant and Britain left without an aircraft carrier with aircraft for a decade.”

Defence select committee member Madeleine Moon, who uncovered the spending through parliamentary questions, said she was “appalled” while Tory MP Patrick Mercer, a former Army officer, raised concerns about a “consultancy culture” at the MoD.

Defence equipment minister Peter Luff insisted £1 billion was being saved by removing the Harrier from service and selling the jets to the US for £110 million. The decision formed part of government efforts to plug a £38 billion black hole in the defence budget which saw tens of thousands of job losses announced and major equipment programmes cut.

The MoD said Alix Partners had been paid the £1.1 million as part of a wider contract to help deliver savings in the department. Last year it emerged the firm was being paid £3,950 a day.

An official stressed the yearly consultancy bill had fallen from £261 million to £26 million under the Coalition. A spokesman said it had been a “difficult but necessary decision” to axe Harrier. The MoD was investing in “modern, cutting-edge aircraft for the future”.

Read more on the Evening Standard website

Aeroplanes can fly because their wings cause the air pressure underneath to be greater than that above, lifting them into the air. But engineers have for years been frustrated by a theory which wrongly explains what causes the change in pressure to occur.

The myth is commonly found in school textbooks and aeroplane flight manuals, and is so widely believed that even Einstein was rumoured to subscribe to it. Now a Cambridge scientist has become so fed up with the bogus explanation that he has created a minute-long video to lay it to rest once and for all. The video, published on YouTube by Prof Holger Babinsky of the university’s engineering department, seeks to explain in simple terms why the myth goes against the laws of physics.

According to conventional wisdom the pressure change happens because the air on the curved upper surface of the wing has further to travel than that below the flat underneath surface, meaning it must travel faster to arrive at the other side of the wing at the same time.

In fact the real explanation is nothing to do with the distance the air has to travel. The curvature of the wing causes the change in air pressure because it pulls some of the air upwards, which reduces pressure, and forces the rest beneath it, creating higher pressure.

A law known as the Bernoulli equation means that when pressure is lower, air moves faster – so the air stream above the wing does move more quickly than the one below, but this is not what causes the difference in pressure.

Prof Babinsky proved his theory by filming smoke passing across a wing.

If traditional wisdom had been correct the smoke above and below the wing should have reached the front edge at the same time.

The video demonstrates that the explanation is fundamentally flawed because the plume above the wing reached the edge much sooner than the plume below.

If the distance the air had to travel was causing the pressure to change, then a boat’s sail – where the air travels the same distance on the inside and outside of the curve – would not work, Prof Babinsky said.

He added: “I don’t know when the explanation first surfaced but it’s been around for decades. You find it taught in textbooks, explained on television and even described in aircraft manuals for pilots.

“There is no law in physics which states when streams of particles start at the leading edge of the wing they should reach the tailing edge at the same time.

“I’ve even heard a story that Einstein drew a design for an aircraft wing with a long, squiggly line on top of an aerofoil to make the distance for the air to travel greater, but this would not work.”

Link to the Daily Telegraph story