| Follow-up to yesterday, big EFL. |
Finding and fixing these kind of problems is hard. I've been involved in a couple cases like this, (though our company makes missiles, not targets), and we spend a lot of time determining if there is even a problem. Sometimes there isn't; it really is operator error. But once we find the problem, then we have to fix it, then fix it in the field. The one thing the customer never wants to hear is "You're going to have to ship all your units back to Tucson to be fixed." Sending them all to a depot isn't much better. Then, of course, your fix works and everything seems OK unless it causes some other long-term or itermittant problem that doesn't show up for a couple years when everyone on the original project has left the company or retired.
If the Navy is really doing everything they can (training, preventive maintenance, constant inspections), then it's just one of those things we have to get through and we'll be fine. If they are sweeping it under the rug (as the press always thinks, and unfortunately is actually true one time in a hundred, that's a different matter.
I put this under "tech," because I couldn't think of a better place. How about a separate section for weapons (of all nations)? Or maybe one about just the US military (all aspects)? In your copious free time, of course. |