Perk Of The Job....

[Philtaz]

.........or gross misuse of taxpayers money?

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-17786315

Given that the future King of England had his own little 'jolly' during his pilot training (landing his Chinook into his finacee's back garden) this does seem trivial.

What say you?

[craft1948]

Well he's the future king...............and they're not.

[Philtaz]

All the more reason for the future King to set a good example then, surely?

[HowardKennitby]

A Chinook! That must be some back garden.

[craft1948]

lol Philtaz looking back through the ages I don't see many good examples being set.

[Philtaz]

Exactly craft, William is set to change the monarchy, or so we are told and be more in touch with reality etc and dispel some of the aloofness of the monarchy.

But is it really worth suspending a coastguard pilot for?

[Gromit]

My butcher has got a big chopper too.



I'll get mi coat.

[HowardKennitby]

Phil

I reckon the suspension will be mandatory until the incident is investigated. This is normal practice in most industries etc.

If pilot did not advise anyone he was going to land then he will have disappeared from radar without trace. This may have caused others to consider a search for him.
Landing on random bits of ground may be fraught with difficulty.
An additional landing and take-off will consume additional fuel .

[Gromit]

Perhaps HRH William was brought up on this,

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fij1lAyCEUY&feature=youtube_gdata_player

[douglas9401]

Re your "King of England", until the glorious revolution arrives he'll lord it over the rest of the UK as well as your parched, formerly green and pleasant land.
Arrogance, ignorance or laziness, please make your selection.

[craft1948]

I'd rather have a King than a President.

[karenmac60]

Yes but the blurb says they "walked over a group of butchers". Surely that is an abuse of power...

[jackthehat]

1. Not necessarily a misuse. I think we'd need to know more facts.
2. He didn't have a 'jolly'.
3. It wasn't a Chinook.
4. See (1)
5. As above.

[Eve]

Way too few facts to judge yet.

Unfortunately, "if" it was a jolly, not being the future king they may not get away with the same perks!

Bit of a different kettle of fish with a chinook mind, that must be one hell of a garden! Hardly likely to have gone unnoticed either unless it was seriously in the middle of nowhere, the things are massive and incredibly noisy and tend to stick out a bit, especially with the tandem rotor.

We get chinooks landing in the park next to me to drop military and medical things off, we've had Sea Kings too. Not likely to go unnoticed, especially at landing altitude.

I'm sure I remember being told once how much it costs to keep a military aircraft like that in the air, was a scary amount and that was probably some time ago back in my RAF cadet days so probably higher now.

[emmie]

perhaps the meat was for his CO, who knows...

[Philtaz]

JTH,
Who didn't have a jolly? One pilot landed his aircraft in his girlfriend's back garden, the other stopped off to get groceries.
I experienced similar instances on helicopter flights whilst in HM Forces and both these instances would have constituted a 'jolly', IMHO!

[jackthehat]

It wasn't a jolly.
It is part of their training.

[Philtaz]

Convenient though that he just happened to be in the same area as his girlfriend when he had to carry out 'training'.

Despite the line taken by his instructors, Air Chief Marshall Torpt took a rather different view.

http://www.dailymail....ter-Kates-garden.html

Not knocking him for doing it (who wouldn't in his position?), I'm more interested in the current story involving the coastguard pilot. He's also had a little 'jaunt', obviously no big deal but someone seems to want to make a meal of it. Hopefully he'll get the right outcome i.e. back to work after an 'interview without coffee'.

[jackthehat]

All trainee pilots do similar.