Controlled Flight Into Terrain.
Germany had issues with aircrew qualification unlike more diverse air forces, where the top 10-20% of graduating trainee pilots get selected for fighters, the rest going to bombers, transports, tankers, etc.,
98% of early 1960s Luftwaffe trainees went directly to F-104s.
There were also issues with the ground crews. Most of the Luftwaffe enlisted were 2 -year term conscripts, whose main interest was getting out and employing their new skills in the rapidly growing West German civil economy. Add in the fact that there weren't a whole lot of experienced NCOs to supervise, and problems are inevitable.[/QUOTE]
Thanks for the intell! I new the post war LW had issues but I'd think it was that bad.
Yep, he needed to take a breath during that lot. There was a period when little was released about the aircraft into the public domain after its cancellation factual wise about the aircraft and its capabilities, and several authors had books published all loaded with the same vitriol. The Murder of TSR.2 by Stephen Hastings was one, TSR.2 Phoenix or Folly by Frank Barnett-Jones was another. Both worth reading to get a sense of the 'national outrage' that people felt after its cancellation, but there are better books out there now since the 30 year rule has passed.
This is misleading. That Short lift platform, the PD.17 wasn't for carrying the TSR.2. It was designed to carry the English Electric P.17A - the designations are wrong in that title - the jet shown in the illustration. This mating of the two platforms as the joint Short Brothers and English Electric proposal to General Operational Requirement No.339 (GOR.339) for a Canberra replacement.
Those evaluating the paper planes preferred elements of the Vickers Supermarine entry, the Type 571 (the last design by the Supermarine drawing office) and the EE P.17A, without the Short PD.17 component as the preferred winner of OR.339, but because EE and Shorts had submitted jointly, a new specification was written to construct a combination of the VS and EE proposals, which was GOR.343, to which the TSR.2 was built.
What would the TSR-2 have been called had it entered service? Most British planes have a name like "Spitfire" and then a designation like Mk.I, Mk.II, and a PR version would be PR.IX (which for some reason I tend to read as Pricks instead of Pee Are Nine)