THE RAF saying it has apologised to the families involved in the fatal air collision above Drayton seems woefully inadequate.

When the accident happened it was a complete tragedy, claiming the lives of instructor Mike Blee and cadet Nicholas Langley-Rice, while injuring glider pilot Henry Freeborn.

Twelve years before the accident, Flt Lt Blee was found to have a condition that restricted the mobility in his neck and thus affected his ability to see fully while flying.

We do not seek to demonise Flt Lt Blee, who had joined to serve his country in 1964. The real issue, admitted by the RAF, is that no one within that organisation looked at his condition and recognised that he should not be flying.

It seems incredible in this age when health and safety runs through any activity or undertaking — occasionally excessively to the ruination of events — that the authorities allowed him to fly, especially with young cadets.

Nicholas Langley-Rice’s parents would have sent their son off expecting the Air Training Corps and RAF to ensure the 15-year-old’s safety was paramount.

This is a tragedy and the Air Training Corps’ assurance it has taken “extensive action” to ensure air experience flying “remains” safe does not answer the question of how this situation was ever allowed to exist in the first place.