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Mechanic's Mistake Trashes $244 Million Aircraft
Hugh Pickens writes "An accident report is finally out for the Air Force E-8C Joint Surveillance Targeting and Attack Radar System that had started refueling with a KC-135 on on March 13, 2009 when the crew heard a 'loud bang throughout the midsection of the aircraft.' Vapor and fuel started pouring out of the JSTARS from 'at least two holes in the left wing just inboard of the number two engine.' The pilot immediately brought the jet back to its base in Qatar where mechanics found the number two main fuel tank had been ruptured, 'causing extensive damage to the wing of the aircraft.' How extensive? 25 million dollars worth of extensive. What caused this potentially fatal and incredibly expensive accident to one of the United States' biggest spy planes? According to the USAF accident report, a contractor accidentally left a plug in one of the fuel tank's relief vents (PDF) during routine maintenance. 'The PDM subcontractor employed ineffective tool control measures,' reads the report. Tool control measures? 'You know, the absolutely basic practice of accounting for the exact location of every tool that is used to work on an airplane once that work is finished.' Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. Norton Schwartz just told Congress, 'there is a JSTARS platform that was damaged beyond economical repair that we will not repair.' So, if this is the one Schwartz is talking about, then one mechanic's mistake has damaged a $244 million aircraft beyond repair."
I've been an A&P for over 35 years and I've seen worse.
(by pilots and mechanics)
A bullet may have your name on it, but artillery is addressed to " Whom It May concern"
Government contractors. Saving you money like they have never saved it before.
you forgot "And suggest private industry could do better"
Self proclaimed typo king, and inventor of the bear destroying coffee table (patent not pending).
The most I ever cost my employer for a screw up is about $1.1 million.
Sounds like a great case for RFID inventory control ; tag every tool, log them out of the toolbox with a loop mounted on the side, log them back in again when you return them.
The article linked mentions this on the second page ; I don't see why you should be limited to the 3M solution though (except maybe they'll bribe someone to make it a regulatory necessity). You can get nearly 2,000 tags for about $100, so it's not like it would be expensive.
It's all ball bearings these days.
244 million? Isn't that minuscule? CEOs regularly crash the stock market. But at least they take responsibility! Like... becoming CEO somewhere else?
A few points occur to me:
1_ ...how $25 million in repairs is "beyond economical repair" on a $240 million plane? If I have a $20,000 car that's in an accident, it's not uncommon to have $2000 in repairs...that's hardly "totalled".
2. Now, looking at the pictures, that's pretty serious...but then it's more than $25 million in damage.
3. the E8 is a converted 707...didn't they stop building those in the 1970s? If this is a 30 year old airframe (at best) then either that damage is $25 million or the plane is worth less than $240 million today.
4. Finally, as I understand it this damage was done by a subcontractor. When I use subcontractors, they have liability insurance to cover the systems they're working on, plus potential liabilities. Doesn't the US government require AT LEAST such protections when farming out work to contractors?
By the way, I'd like to further remind the Air Force that this is a COMBAT aircraft. Granted, it's not supposed to be in dogfights or shot at, but this is a piece of military equipment, maintained in difficult conditions/circumstances by relatively inexperienced crew (for example an aircraft carrier's crew largely is swapped out about every 18-36 months). That seems incompatible with its evident fragility.
-Styopa
$25 million? It's not as if they had to repair the toilets or anything . . .
You lost an airframe. A significant fraction of that $244 million is payload and equipment that will be recovered and used as "spare parts" to maintain other JSTARS aircraft. The airframe is all that was lost. The airframe is a commercial 707 derivative. It's not an $244 million aircraft, it's a tricked out $5 million dollar aircraft. The issue, now, is replacing the system -- which means assembling another JSTARS. Given typical government contracting practices that will cost another $325 million (inflation adjusted from initial cost of $244 million in 1998).
If he were a banker he'd get a bonus ?
The Cloud - because you don't care if your apps and data are up in the air.
Simply weight the toolbox on the way out and again on the way back in.
blame "a contractor".
Especially when the contractor WAS negligent.
None of the AWACS/JSTARS/etc planes are "made to be shot at". They're civilian airframes stuffed to the gills with super-secret electronics. They rely on fighters and ECM to stay up; they don't do any fighting themselves. Heck, they're unarmed.
Of course they do. My problem is all the suggestions that Private industry does significantly better, ESPECIALLY when funded by the government. I think that's when we see the worst of the waste, private industry on the government's payroll.
Self proclaimed typo king, and inventor of the bear destroying coffee table (patent not pending).
It is ass-covering of the lowest order to blame a lowly mechanic for what is obviously a design flaw. A simple sensor to monitor the presence of a plug
Terrible design mistake because now someone needs to maintain, replace, test, and probably F-up that sensor. Also its heavy. The better design involves multiple permanently installed frangible disks on extra vent piping.
See how hard design is? Finding incompetence is always easier than designing around it. First guess is usually wrong. That's probably what happened to the A+P mechanic, too.
"Science flies us to the moon. Religion flies us into buildings." - Victor Stenger
Any alternative is better than Affirmative Action. Giving someone a job because they belong to a minority is equivalent to not giving someone a job because they aren't in the minority, which is racist/sexist.
Remember that the airframe for this airplane (a KC-135) is basically a late 50s-early 60s design/build.
Whatever. Back then engineers had to be smarter because they couldn't rely on computers. The days of iron men, not heavy iron mainframes... Age is no excuse for poor design, assuming thats what you meant.
More likely, since this has not been a popular failure mode over the past half century, the cost of designing it out probably exceeds the cost of just eating an airframe every century or two.
"Science flies us to the moon. Religion flies us into buildings." - Victor Stenger
If I remember Srimati teacher correctly, apparently a whole kingdom was lost because some cobbler missed nailing one nail in the shoe of one horse. I, along with rest of the class, had actually memorized the entire report of the investigation committee. We delivered the report to an assembly of interested parties ( Mohan master accompanied us on the xylaphone) on the annual day of the Mahatma Gandhi Elementary. From the standing ovation we got, I assume our report was spot on and was accepted with great appreciation.
sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
World War II, if you watch enough of the History Channel, boiled down to quantity winning over quality. Our Sherman Tanks, for example, were utter crap compared to the Panzer and Tiger tanks. But, the USA was able to build a lot of them and they were simple and cheap. The Panzer and Tiger, however, were built in small numbers because they were complex machines.
Germany was 10 years ahead of the USA technologically. But, Germany wasn't able to build to the quantity needed to fight an industrial giant like the USA, especially while we were bombing their industrial capacity to zero (and losing 60% of our aircraft to do it).
It is sad that USA is now following Germany's example. We are building overly complex, hugely expensive equipment that cannot be easily field serviced, and building them in limited numbers because we cannot afford them in great quantity.
Eventually, even though we are 10 years ahead of every opponent technologically, someone will be able to over-run us in a drawn out war simply by having great numbers of simpler, cheaper equipment, and a lot of it.
And I think we all know who's the industrial giant now, that can produce great quantities of material quickly and cheaply.....
If telephones are outlawed, then only outlaws will have telephones.
Ben Rich (head of Lockhead in the 90's) said in his book that one time he was at the GE engine plant. One of the guys was pointed at two jet engines. He said they were the exact same engine. The only difference was one was for the Air Force and had 200 extra inspectors look at it and cost twice as much for that reason. Next time you want to blame the contractors for how much things cost take into consideration all the extra regs and paperwork they are required to do. Another fav of his is how they go crazy labeling things secret or top secret. That doubles the paperwork and makes all their work that much more difficult.
He compared the overall cost of a new plane for the air force to the overall cost of the new model for the Mustang. The amounts were fairly close. Ford gets to spread the cost over thousands of cars. The manufacturer of a planes gets to spread the cost over a few hundred planes.
Is he strong? Listen bud, He's got radioactive blood.
How about doing what every handyman does in his garage: hanging the tools on a board and tracing an outline of all of them.
Exactly.
Also, it's wrong to claim that if it is a design flaw then the mechanic isn't at fault. There is a standard procedure for maintenance and tool handling and the PDM contractor failed to follow it. If you read the accident report, you will see the disclaimer that it can't be used as evidence in a civil or criminal proceeding. The mopst likely consequence of this incident is that it will be written into the prime contractor's performace report and will thus affect future contract bids (contrary to popular belief, the government doesn't automatically award to the lowest bidder).
Actually, Atul Gawande has a whole book about how such simple things checklists vastly could help improve medical outcomes.
And he reports the surgeons are mostly resistant to the idea.
the preceding comment is my own and in no way reflects the opinion of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
If you read the actual congressional testimony, you would have seen that Schwartz didn't say that it wasn't repairable for ~$25M, which is 10% of the cost of the whole system, he bemoaned his budget constraints, and said they wouldn't repair it as an example answer to the question "Is there any sacrifice you're seeing in ISR...?". Also note that they're only not repairing *the platform*.
The title of the press release from the Public Affairs office more or less says it all: "Air Force Strategic Choices and Budget Priorities Brief at the Pentagon".
-- Terry
Which reminds me (sadly) of Armageddon, the movie.
When they're about to launch and Rockhound (Steve Buscemi) says "You know we're sitting on four million pounds of fuel, one nuclear weapon and a thing that has 270,000 moving parts built by the lowest bidder. Makes you feel good, doesn't it?"
There are two types of people in the world: Those who crave closure
The accident occurred March 13th 2009, but the news is the Air Force accident investigative board’s report on the incident, including photographs, which is only recently available.
Here is what bothers me: if you're black and you make a mistake it's because you're black.
This is not fair both to the black person because he can make mistakes like any other (white) person, and to black people because they are suddenly set to impossibly high standards.
Are you serious?
The engines on a medium/large private jet can run you about a million each, and that's for a unit that GE mass-produces for civilian use. That you're saying a gas turbine is elegantly simple means that you've never ever ever worked on one. Ever.
Ever.
The concept might be simple, but when you're got a huge shaft studded with titanium blades spinning at 10,000 RPM and then you're intentionally using all of that compressed air to cause an explosion.. well, it doesn't take a rocket surgeon to see that you're not going to bang one of these babies together over the weekend in your garage.
As for the aircraft, wings can and do cost a significant amount of money. If the wing spar was damaged, then the aircraft is toast.
"and this aircraft is obviously impractical for "combat" conditions where it may need to be field serviced under less-than-ideal conditions"
"Another waste of taxpayer money"
The E8C is a converted 'used' Boeing 707. The last of those were manufactured int 1979. So, this is an old airframe design (and we didn't pay a lot for them). So, it doesn't have some of the bells and whistles that newer aircraft have. Some systems have been up fitted and enhanced. But not all.
This is not a 'front line' aircraft. Just like the KC-135 that I flew on, they operate mostly out of large bases that have plenty of service and support infrastructure. So, it is almost always being serviced in ideal conditions (or as ideal as they are going to get). A contracted mechanic didn't follow procedures. It is that simple.
Also, there are times when older technology has an advantage. This aircraft's cousin (KC-135) stood ready to launch on alert 7 x 24 x 365 for decades and could be started at temperatures from well below freezing to well over 100 (F) and be in the air in less than 3 minutes. Try doing that with today's aircraft. I seem to remember newer aircraft needing air conditioning on the ground to keep the electronics cool while they sat on alert.
This air frame's longevity and versatility says it all. When I got out of the Air Force in 1990, I had been flying on aircraft that were built as long ago as 1957. Many that I crewed on were older than I was. But, with good maintenance, they were great airplanes. I think we got our money's worth.
Forgive the rant, but:
It is not a "spy" plane, it is a "surveillance" plane. Ever since the 2001 Hainan Island incident this mistake has really irked me. The Chinese used it as a rhetorical club to beat us with when GWB chickened out and let them chop up our plane and imprison our crew.
A "spy" plane would be one that is designed/intended to escape detection and/or interception while conducting surveillance in places it has no right to be (such as the U2 and SR-71 or the Global Hawk). During the cold war, the Soviet Union consistently protested our overflights of their territory with the U2 and SR71, and sought (and once succeeded) to shoot them down, as was their right. Those were "spy" planes, and Francis Gary Powers was, technically, a "spy."
The JSTARS E-8 and the Hainan EP-3E are both military versions of the Boeing 707 -- they aren't designed to hide from or evade anyone trying to see and/or catch them. They are big obvious platforms that fly in neutral territory (or over an actively declared battle zone when we have air dominance) and provide surveillance and other capability. They aren't hiding or trying to deceive anyone.
I'm a lawyer with excellent karma. Something's gotta be wrong.
Why would a plane with so much advanced electronics on board not have a check system or pre-flight checklist item to look for such an installed plug. Supposed a swarm of bees had built a nest in there and blocked it instead of the mechanic's error?
If something as simple as a plugged vent can cause complete and catastrophic damage to the craft then there needs to be pre/in flight monitoring of that system. Seems a simple pressure gauge in the tank would have prevented this situation from becoming life threatening.
Article X: The powers not delegated... by the Constitution...are reserved...to the people
Since the Air Force has dozens of spares of this particular airframe, it is more economical to pull a newer one out of storage and move all the stuff that makes a JSTAR a JSTAR to a new plane.
JSTARS is not built on the C-135 airframe, exactly, but they share a common ancestor. JSTARS aircraft were built on a number of different commercially available used Boeing 707 variants. Essentially, each one was a custom installation. Air Mobility Command could not spare any viable KC-135 airframes for JSTARS, as they needed every refueler they could manage to maintain the fleet to meet unified command requirements. The other special purpose EC/RC/OC-135s were not available either, as their missions took precedence over the JSTARS effort.
The JSTARS program likely will not receive adequate funds to purchase another airframe and integrate the equipment. It's more likely that the JSTARS equipment and viable airframe parts form this aircraft will be salvaged for spares to extend the lives of the remaining JSTARS aircraft. Other platforms are more likely to be funded to absorb portions of the JSTARS capability. This decision will be driven by high and growing supportability costs for JSTARS.
Invenio via vel creo
The issue is that REPLACEMENT cost is not the same thing as VALUE.
Even if the thing cost $224 million new, or costs $224 million to replace, that doesn't mean that the one that broke is worth $224 million.
The options are:
- Buy a new one for $224 million
- Repair this one for $25 million
- Scrap this one and get along with one less.
If you're in a situation where you now have 29 working models of them but you only use 15 at a time, paying $25 million to get back up to 30 of them doesn't make any sense.
Especially if you're going to replace all 30 with the next generation of equipment in the near future.
paintball