Dangerous Incorporated
12-05-2006, 01:07 PM
Teapot used to plug hole in fuselage
The crew of a British Royal Air Force Nimrod plane used a teapot to block a hole in the fuselage after a mid-air mechanical fault,
the service said on Monday.
The airmen from the RAF base in Kinloss, north-east Scotland, used the pot to plug a 20cm hole when a hatch door failed to close properly.
"There was a minor malfunction with the hatch cover and the teapot would have been used to make it more comfortable for the crew," a spokesperson said.
"At no time was aircrew safety compromised."
The plane - similar to one which crashed in Afghanistan in September, killing all 14 people on board - was returning to Kinloss from Cornwall, south-west England, at the time of the incident.
"The aircraft had to limp home at 8 000 feet with
the teapot over an eight-inch hole in the fuselage because the pressure doors couldn't close - again," Scotland's Daily Record newspaper quoted a senior RAF officer as saying.
The unnamed officer also claimed that some Nimrods are flying with instruments held on with sticky tape and that crews have reported four major fuel leaks since the fatal Afghanistan crash.
The entire Nimrod MR2 fleet was grounded for urgent safety checks after the reconnaissance plane came down in Kandahar in southern Afghanistan due to a technical problem.
Nimrods were introduced in 1969 as a long-range maritime patrol plane derived from the Comet, the world's first jet-powered airliner.
They are one of the world's most recognisable aircraft because of their "double bubble" fuselage, snub nose cone and in-flight refuelling probe protruding from above the cockpit.
The crew of a British Royal Air Force Nimrod plane used a teapot to block a hole in the fuselage after a mid-air mechanical fault,
the service said on Monday.
The airmen from the RAF base in Kinloss, north-east Scotland, used the pot to plug a 20cm hole when a hatch door failed to close properly.
"There was a minor malfunction with the hatch cover and the teapot would have been used to make it more comfortable for the crew," a spokesperson said.
"At no time was aircrew safety compromised."
The plane - similar to one which crashed in Afghanistan in September, killing all 14 people on board - was returning to Kinloss from Cornwall, south-west England, at the time of the incident.
"The aircraft had to limp home at 8 000 feet with
the teapot over an eight-inch hole in the fuselage because the pressure doors couldn't close - again," Scotland's Daily Record newspaper quoted a senior RAF officer as saying.
The unnamed officer also claimed that some Nimrods are flying with instruments held on with sticky tape and that crews have reported four major fuel leaks since the fatal Afghanistan crash.
The entire Nimrod MR2 fleet was grounded for urgent safety checks after the reconnaissance plane came down in Kandahar in southern Afghanistan due to a technical problem.
Nimrods were introduced in 1969 as a long-range maritime patrol plane derived from the Comet, the world's first jet-powered airliner.
They are one of the world's most recognisable aircraft because of their "double bubble" fuselage, snub nose cone and in-flight refuelling probe protruding from above the cockpit.