The Nimrod Review - Official Documents

10A.39
10A.40
Chapter 10A – Nimrod Safety Case: The Facts (Phases 1 and 2)
Systems had “insufficient resource”, specifically in the Safety and Certification Department, fully to support
the programme. This was echoed by Eric Prince in relation to the workload of the Systems Department on 3
October 2002 at the internal NSC launch meeting. Eric Prince explained in evidence that the department was
at the time “unusually busy” dealing with Nimrod and VC10 operational modifications, maintenance queries
(PDS tasks) and putting together estimates.
BAE Systems’ personnel were required to operate under tight budgetary constraints. The NSC was a ‘noncore’
project and, therefore, had to be separately budgeted for and the man-hours monitored. If the manhours
estimate was exceeded, BAE Systems’ Commercial Department had to be consulted. In an internal
e-mail dated 8 October 2002, BAE Systems’ Customer Support warned Richard Oldfield (presciently): “we
mustn’t go down the route of excessive planning/ undertaking tasks we have not budgeted for, and therefore
will eat away at the hours we have.” Richard Oldfield explained that he and Chris Lowe seemed to have a
“different idea” from Eric Prince and Witness C [BAE Systems] of what was involved in the project and this
needed to be resolved. It is not clear, however, that this was ever resolved.
It is regrettable that more thought and planning was not given by BAE Systems at an early stage to the
question of resources for the NSC. The issue of inadequate manpower resources was to resurface regularly
in the next couple of years and have a significant impact during the latter stages of finalising Phase 2 of the
NSC in the summer of 2004.
11 June 2002: QinetiQ Task Review Meeting
10A.41
At a QinetiQ Task Review Meeting (TRM) on 11 June 2002, it was noted that the PSWG had met in March
2002 and, although QinetiQ’s role was still to be defined, “their involvement is not in doubt”. QinetiQ
personnel did indeed remain involved in the NSC throughout, but the nature of their involvement was not
what it should have been.
August 2002: BAE Systems’ proposal for Phase 1
10A.42
10A.43
In its formal Proposal for Phase 1 of the NSC dated August 2002, BAE Systems reiterated the theme:
“By virtue of a range of traditional methods (certification and qualification/integrity
testing), there is already a high level of confidence in the prevailing level of safety of
Nimrod types. However, there is currently a lack of structured argument and supporting
evidence formally recorded and maintained.” (emphasis added)
The Proposal provided that the Zonal Hazard Analysis (ZHA) was to be the same as that for the Jaguar.
10A.44 There were to be two phases to the NSC process: Phase 1: the identification and initial assessment of hazards,
the production of the Fault Tree and the completion of the ZHA. An important element of this phase was said
to be the visit to, and assessment of, an MR2 and an R1; Phase 2: The population of the Hazard Log (HL) with
evidence ‘mitigating’ each hazard identified during Phase 1.
BAE Systems’ price for Phase 1
10A.45
Due to the short timescale, only one interim review meeting with the Nimrod IPT was proposed for Phase
1. The price quoted by BAE Systems for Phase 1 of the NSC was £118,972, including 12% profit. This was
based on an estimate of 1,524 man hours. Richard Oldfield explained in interview with the Review that it was
difficult for BAE Systems to quote for the whole task because there were so many unknowns. Accordingly,
BAE Systems decided to quote initially for Phase 1 only, before deciding what Phase 2 might entail. (It should
be noted that the actual profit made by BAE Systems on Phase 1 was, in fact, 26.1%, primarily due to the
man hours allocated to contract risk not being utilised, and the number of project management hours being
less than originally estimated. By way of comparison, BAE Systems was in due course to make a loss of 8%
on Phase 2, due to the actual number of hours recorded being greater than that estimated).
199