Daily Mirror :- "Red Arrows face axe"

[Gary]

The front of tomorrow Daily Mirror, just shown on Sky News and on their twitter feed



https://twitter.com/SkyNews" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;


Ooops didn't think it would come out that big

[Aircraftpaulcornwall]

Hi Gary,
That's really bad news - unfortunately this is the way that things are going nowadays - with all of the proposed defence cuts!! --Paul

[reheat]

And the runway is getting resurfaced at Scampton.It sounds about right.

[Pune]

Is this just another tabloid rumour?
We can hope.

[reheat module]

It's a theme that raises its head each time a military financial cull is on the radar.
In an age where the military budget is consistently squeezed (and I've been subjected to it for 37 yrs so know the effect first hand), let me pose the following:
Our boys and girls are limited in number, limited in assets, limited in equipment and deployed in austere dangerous conditions, what do they need... Top cover? Better protection? Safer environments? or a nominally UK based display team (albeit fantastic at what they do, and yes I'm hugely aware of what else they achieve).
The military involvement around the world is costly and I see that priorities have to be made, my fear is that once a decision is made (if so), with fiscal events it may be difficult to regenerate a military display team in the immediate future.

[reheat]

Sky News are reporting that the M.O.D. are denying any knowledge of the Reds being done away with.

[chrisfg1]

Could be a nice bit of spin from Cameron's crew. Saint Dave might 'personally' step in to save the Reds. Wouldn't defence be great if we could just take the politics out of it!!?

[Dazza37]

What complete and utter bilge... (the non-story in the Daily Mirror that is...)

-Dazza

[steve149c]

Tabloid crap as usual!

[Pen Pusher]

BBC Breakfast doing a review of the newspaper front pages at the moment and apparently 10 Downing Street have contacted the BBC to say the Daily Mirror story is totally untrue.

So they are being disbanded.

Brian

[22A]

How ironic; many years ago a senior RAF officer writing in "Air clues" suggested that to keep funding for the front line we should scrap the Red Arrows & the BBMF. "If the public want to see something at an airshow, then have Harriers making short take offs and Jaguars performing grass operations". All these years later we've lost the Harriers & Jags, but still have the Reds and BBMF.

[C24]

Man management?

Most military organisations work best when morale is high & everyone is pushing their personal skills envelope, trying to be better than their peers.
Every pilot wants to be a Top Gun candidate, then a TG Instructor. Remove the motivation of becoming a Red Arrow pilot & there would be no incentive for the highly skilled squadron pilot. No competion at a very high level brings lower standards.

To reach the selection process for the RAs, Instructors hone their skills which trickle down to the training programme, too.

The Red Arrows provides the imputus for a better set of pilots thoughout the RAF who would have the necessary [higher] skill set to provide cover for the chaps on the ground.

Expressed in another way, all carting drivers would like to drive in F1.

Having expressed my opinion, I fear that 'Reheat' could be correct - a lot of money is due to be spent on the runway repairs at RAF Scampton.

[SteveS]

Wow!



FREE BOOKS!!!!!

[C24]

'Col's avatar re-inforces my point. No Red Arrows, would he be trying to learn joined-up sky writing using computer software? Nice one, Col.

[C24]

Hi Col,

I know that I shouldn't encourage you, but there is a wide angle lens for sale on eBay that would just do for your next trip.

I'm planning to go to Cranwell tomorrow - Just imagine if they drop the 'ol' and make a '24'!!

[reheat module]

Nice bit of cropping on the avatar, I hope the bit missing after Col didn't read 'lapsed after military cull'