RSAF has done much to boost flight safety By David Boey THOUGH military aviation is inherently dangerous, the Republic of Singapore Air Force (RSAF) has done much to make air force flights safe.
A study of RSAF aircraft and helicopters lost in aerial accidents shows that the air force has achieved fewer crashes and fewer fatalities in recent years compared to the RSAF's formative years.
When air crashes do occur, these accidents tend to be far more survivable now than air crashes in the 1970s.
The RSAF's improved track record did not pop up overnight but was the result of a sustained effort to build up safety consciousness among all ranks.
Some other air forces have failed to shrug off their bad flight-safety record because their senior officers have not remedied safety hazards like poor pilot training, shoddy aircraft maintenance, improperly scripted standard operational procedures or inadequately maintained airbase infrastructure.
The RSAF's improved safety record is commendable in view of its higher operational tempo - which means more intense flying - and the larger fleet of fighters, support aircraft and helicopters in its order of battle.
From 1970 to 1979, the RSAF lost 16 pilots from 21 fighter-aircraft crashes. One Hawker Hunter was damaged in a mid-air collision but managed to return to its airbase safely. More than 70 per cent of the crashes in the 1970s were fatal ones.
The 10 years between 1990 to 1999 saw nine RSAF personnel (six helicopter pilots and three helicopter aircrewmen) die in three helicopter crashes. No fighter pilot died during this period.
From 1990 to 1999, the RSAF lost five choppers, three fighters and three jet trainers. One F-16A fighter, which was badly damaged in a mid-air collision with another F-16A in July 1991, managed to limp back to Paya Lebar Airbase and has been rebuilt.
All RSAF deaths that occurred from 1990 to 1999 involved Super Puma transport helicopters. These carry two pilots and at least one aircrewman in the passenger compartment.
Catastrophic helicopter crashes are less survivable than accidents involving aircraft equipped with ejection seats because chopper crews cannot bail out of their stricken machines.
The fact that there is a 16-year gap between the previous death of an RSAF fighter pilot and last month's fatal crash involving Lieutenant Brandon Loo Kwang Han, 25, underscores the part that safety devices like ejection seats have played in saving aircrew lives.
The last fatal crash involving an RSAF fighter pilot took place on May 24, 1988, in the Philippines. In that incident, a 23-year-old pilot ejected from a Hawker Hunter just outside Clark Airbase. He was picked up by a United States Air Force rescue chopper but died from his injuries.
Unlike ejection seats used today, which can safely extract a pilot even if his aircraft is stationary on the ground, a Hunter pilot needed to achieve a minimum height and airspeed for his parachute to open safely. The pilot involved in the Clark Airbase crash was barely at the safety threshold, so his injuries were severe.
Between that crash and the death of Lt Loo after his fighter crashed on May 19 during a night-training flight in the Arizona desert, 10 RSAF fixed-wing aircraft have crashed but their pilots all survived.
Several other aircraft were involved in minor incidents, like veering off runways, but no serious injuries to pilots were reported.
Such news may be cold comfort to the family, friends and colleagues of Lt Loo, whose ashes were placed in their final resting place yesterday afternoon at Foo Hai Ch'an Monastery.
While we mourn his loss, Singaporeans can take heart that the RSAF has built up a robust safety-management apparatus that will get to the bottom of the tragic crash and ensure that lessons learnt are disseminated in a proper and timely manner.
The formation of the RSAF Flight Test Centre means the air force can work with the defence industry and defence science community to test and install devices to make RSAF aircraft safer.
These run the gamut from ejection seats and parachutes, to devices that can launch decoys to protect aircraft against anti-aircraft missiles, thereby boosting the aircraft's operational safety.
Airbase infrastructure has improved significantly since the 1970s. The decision to build Changi East Airbase and the runway on Pulau Sudong means RSAF pilots have alternative landing strips should emergencies arise.
These airstrips are a vital safety feature as flight paths leading to Paya Lebar Airbase and Tengah Airbase take aircraft over densely populated areas.
One can appreciate the enormity of the task the RSAF faces in managing safety when one considers that the RSAF is one of the few air forces in the world where the sun never sets on its flight-training regime.
This is because the RSAF maintains detachments in places as far flung as Australia, Brunei, France and the United States. So its training management philosophy must operate not only round the clock, but also round the globe in different climates and flying conditions.
The RSAF cannot hope for a zero-accident rate. The only way for any air force to achieve a zero-accident rate is for it to keep its warplanes grounded.
That being an impractical measure, the RSAF must continue to work to manage the consequences of air accidents by doing all it can to make such mishaps survivable.
Warplanes can always be replaced, but pilots and aircrew are irreplaceable.
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