Thursday 19 July 2007

Don’t ground ’em… just crash ’em

It was not until I received a mail from one of my former classmates that I actually begin to follow the development of the incident. I was left wordless when I read that mail, sent to our class of 95 yahoo mail-group. The mail talks about the recently crashed landed Nuri helicopter… the pilot was our former classmate, Kapten Nor Azlan Termuzi.

As some of you may know, the military helicopter went missing last Friday 10 minutes after taking off and the wreckage was found mid of yesterday. There were 6 on-board the helicopter, none survived. Me and my former classmates lost a friend today.

The reason why I did not pay much attention to the missing helicopter until I know Azlan was piloting it was because Nuri helicopter crashes bear much resemblance to haze in this counter… they happen rather frequent, so frequent that it warrants a “huh, crash again?” reaction. We are either fed up with it, or just couldn’t be bothered as it doesn’t concern us. To me, it was both.

How frequent are the crashes if you may asked...

Well, inclusive of Azlan and his crew, 67 people have died in 11 crashes (I counted them from statistics shown in today’s Star newspaper). The first crash happened 1 year after the Nuri was introduced to the Malaysian Air Force, with 3 crashes and 2 emergency landings in the last 4 years alone.

Is there something seriously wrong with these helicopters? Of course not!! As reported in today’s news … “The Nuris have been properly maintained and are in good condition”. Hence, despite all these crashes, the Nuris will not be grounded. There will be an investigation done on this latest crash and then they will decide whether the Nuris will be grounded.

Wait a minute… shouldn’t they be grounding these helicopters until they are proven safe and not flying them until they are proven dangerous. Oh yeah, I forgot, this is just our way of doing things. Besides, all those who are dead are not some big shot VIP but just our regular soldiers. Also, the Nuris are just 40 years old and since we still got more than 20 of them… yeah, don’t ground ‘em… just crash ‘em… crash ‘em all…

To Azlan, I will always remember you as that guy who ran in the 5,000 metres race during the 1994 sports day and emerged second. And when I saw how tired you were, I asked how they hell are you going to run in the 100m and 400m sprint… you smiled and said “Jangan takut”.

Azlan emerged as champion in the 100m and 400m sprint.

May you rest in peace my friend.

63 comments:

Anonymous said...
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
Weig said...

Such a waste of life.

One of the Nuri crashes happened when I was in secondary school and over where my housing estate was. I recalled waking in the middle of the night (actually, it was wee hours of the morning) hearing a sound like my fan was going to break and crash right on top of me. After a while, the noise stopped. I fell back asleep.

Then, a few hours later, I woke to sounds of sirens that continued throughout till noon. In that crash, it involved some big shot whose name I forgot.

Anonymous said...

So sorry to know that he was your friend... may all of them rest in peace...

Life is short...

Huei said...

may your friend rest in peace

i heard in the radio today that the pilot was reluctant to drive that thing..such tragedy

me said...

the malaysian way. sad, huh? i also know of a friend who lost his father through the nuri crash way. if you are in the army....helicopter crashes will be more likely to kill you than....say the most common cause of death - cancer. the really infuriating part is.....the govt's attitude. after only so many crashes every yr....now only some stupid idiot's lightbulb lighted and someone says......maybe we shld be thinking abt changing them....duh!!!! wht i don't get is....it's clearly a way for them to make more money (if u get wat i mean)....why hvn't someone done it earlier??

ppsstt...btw, hv you told us the answer to why time is funny in here?

rinnah said...

So sorry to hear that your friend was one of those who perished in the Nuri crash. May he rest in peace.

I wonder how many more crashes it will take before they wake up and do something about it?

Eileen said...

Life is so unpredictable. May your friend rest in peace and his family can get over the tragic loss soon.

Purple~MushRooM said...

Same case... have to wait until a big shot finally died in a Nuri crash then they will really do something about it.

guaisaujai said...

So sorry to hear about this and may all of them rest in peace...

Hope they really do sth useful this time and not just raise up this issue and do nothing at the end....

TingTitLei said...

may he rest in piece ...

for a country where elite police can bomb foreigners up.. i can say that im really not surprised at all

Kenny Mah said...

Hey bro, I'm sorry to hear about the loss of your friend, as well as that of the entire crew. May they rest in peace.

Really makes us wake up and wonder how brief our lives can be and what are we doing with the minutes we have right now in our hands, eh?

I sense you too are trying to make most of your time on earth to do something fruitful. It scares me to think I'd leave one day and not have done anything good for the people around me.

Here's to living our lives to the fullest!

Anonymous said...

may God vless those poor souls .. darn it .. get some "blackout" instead .. by the way, what copter is blackout? Apache?

Anonymous said...

sad for them, RIP~
back in 97' while I was working in LIMA air show, Nuri was the ugliest bird there.. it look really 'chan(poor maintained)' then. with rivet bolt style outershell, it really too old school bird to continue being in service.

zewt said...

Robin Goodfellow - thank you for your comment. but i think i will have to remove your comment as i don really need anything over-political in this blog. good comment nonetheless, but yeah, freedom of speech... wishful thinking.

Cirnelle - wow... imagine it crashed into your house, u would not have lived to tell this tale.

angel - indeed... let us live it to the fullest.

Huei - i asked him once... he said... 'no choice'.

me - i am actually surprise why they dont buy new ones... cos wouldnt that means... well, u know.... new toys? :P the time thingy... go figure out la, so damn easy.

rinnah - glad to know that they will be slowly phasing it out per today's news.

Princess Eileen - unpredictable is sometimes good, but not to this extend.

zewt said...

purple mushroom - yeah, but i was told that some one big did die... i wonder who.

guaisaujai - yeah, let us all wait and see.

TTL - hahaha... you're right there.

Kenny Mah - yeah, making the best out of life at the moment. let us not let even a second goes to waste!

cibol - blackout? think i need to read the news again...

-=Sin=- - if i am not wrong, i think they have reached their flight age already... but they did a massive over-haul which supposed to increase their flight life... didnt turn out well i think. or maybe it's our way of doing over-haul.

Anonymous said...

Aiyoh.. that is so sad.. When I read the newspapers saying there is no survivor, I already felt truly bad about it.

Yeah - There has been umpteenth times that the accident happened and I don't understand why can't they just quarantined it.

and when I read what the Deputy PM said - I felt utterly disgusted. PRAY THAT SUCH THINGS WON'T HAPPEN AGAIN.

Is there a guarantee?

day-dreamer said...

I'm sorry to hear that that is your friend.

Just like the Chinese primary school teacher who fell to his dead (due to the termites-infested floor) - he was my teacher - the government doesn't seem to do anything until lives were loss, does it?

I wonder how many people have to sacrifice before they finally wake up.

me said...

that's what i said lah. new purchase means deeper pockets for them mah. why the reluctance? i don't get.

don't want lah. so easy, so easy. i can't figure it out. how easy can it be?

pssstttt....how did you manage to reply to our comments? hijackked somebdy's laptop during lunch?

Lingzie said...

i never realized there were so many Nuri crashes until i read the stats in the Star yesterday. today's paper states that they will phase out Nuris in the next 3 years...shouldn't it be done immediately?? plus, they have yet to say why this particular Nuri crashed.

true, there is never a guarantee that air crashes won't happen, but shouldn't they make sure that our soldiers are safe and not 'sacrificed in vain'?

zewt, i'm truly sorry about your friend and the other 5 soldiers. may they rest in peace.

baggie said...

I am sorry to hear you losing a friend, may he rest in peace. And I seriously hope G would investigate properly the reasons of the crashes.. I think it must have been the helicopters. hmm..

Albert Yap said...

What a waste...we lost a great athlete and a yet be be conutry leader......

What a waste...if we grounded the Nuri....just let them keep on flying until the all crashed...

What a waste...We are paying for these investigators and commanders salaries....

What a waste...if we still let these potential leaders to work under these potential killers....

Rabbit said...

Oh so he was ur friend.. may he rest in peace!

Anonymous said...

Nuris are 30 to 40 years old. yet, we are still using them after their shelf life has expired. The heros are sacrificed and I wonder how many ministers wil dare to sit in these Nuris.
if only the millions of commission, paid for the purchases of the fighter planes and submarines, are used to modernise the fleet of helicopters ( with of course proper maintenance), there wouldnt be so many tragedies over the yaers. I guess their lifes are not as worthy as the Ministers and are therefore can be risked.

Anonymous said...

Sorry to hear about your friend.

May God Bless His Soul!

J.T. said...

Typical reaction from the powers that be - "Never mind... still can fly." When it does not involve some top person, life goes on. If some VIP had gone down in that crash, situation would be "all Nuris grounded until further investigation." *sigh*

My condolences to you and Azlan's family. May Azlan rest in peace.

Azlan Zed said...

may he rest in peace...

The Miserable said...

This is one of the worst news to our country. Rest in peace, friend...

Helen said...

I'm so sorry to hear that. I think news is news until you are actually able to pin a face to the news and it becomes much more than that. Much more personal and real...

I heard from the morning radio there were 95 incidence.... you mentioned 67, but then no matter which, the number is substantial!

Let's hope the military will do the right thing. Like you said, there's no place for a 40 year old copter in the air.

May your friend RIP.

Anonymous said...

Sounds like the case of the KTM Komuter trains, NONE of which have been overhauled on schedule (and the MD of KTMB was actually dumb enough to say this out loud in public where he could be quoted). My bro takes the KTM Komuter to work and back every day. I'm worried about him :(

Sorry to hear about your friend. Makes one feel so impotently angry.

H.C. Tan said...

sigh!~

King's wife said...

It happens over and over again, and we are kinda numbed to it. Sigh...
Sorry to hear that he was your friend. May he rest in peace.
May they all rest in peace.

may said...

sorry to hear that it was your friend in the crash. may he rest in peace.

it's such a strange, sad feeling when one of your classmates pass away in an accident. I had one who passed on many years ago in a head-on collision. I wonder every now and again, what life would've had in store for her, had she lived.

**************Jz***************** said...

hey....he's quite good looking too....yea may he r.i.p....

narrowband said...

I'm sorry to hear that one of the victims was someone known to you. It's crap that they took things lightly just because no 'significant' lost of life was reported.

But I'm glad they will begin phasing out the chopper.

J u n e said...

So sorry to hear..May he R.I.P

neno said...

i haf no idea wat Nuri is..tat shows how ignorant i am..been a long time since i read the newspaper..

sorry to hear bout ur fren..may he rest in peace..

choulyin.tan said...

very sorry to hear about your friend...may his soul rest in peace.

Personally, I have never lost someone to a helicopter crash, but a friend of mine has lost her dad in one...it was 12 July 2004, the Ba Kelalan crash somewhere near the rural areas outside Limbang (I think)..it was an agonizing wait for them because it took weeks to finally find their bodies...and til now, my friend still hasn't gotten over the fact that her dad was taken from them too fast, too soon..

zewt said...

anigma - well, today's news brought some light. but they should be grounded immediately... not slowly phased out. but i think i know what's the reason behind it. cant talk here la.

day dreamer - unfortunately... they are still in deep slumber.

me - i have my ways la... haha...

lingzie - thanks... i feel bad i couldnt make it to the funeral today. he was buried while i was working.

calvin's wife - i think so too. i think these choppers are really old already.

Albert Yap - haha... wasting is our game.

Rabbi - yeah he is. sad indeed.

zewt said...

anon @ 2.39pm - whatever it is... let us hope for a better future for our soldiers.

Jemima - thanks jemima.

JT - yeah... i totally agree with u. but today's news brought some light. not good enough but at least something.

alan zed - indeed.

tiuniasing - could have been worse. one of the blogger here said a nuri crashed NEAR her house before.

Helen - yeah... 40 year old chopper. for goodness sake, even the concorde has already been grounded and we are still flying our nuris.

irene - impotently angry!! hahaha... i like that word. yeah... i think they wont do anything about those trains. and even if they do, i wonder if it will be done sub-standardly.

zewt said...

HC Tan - indeed... sigh...

king's wife - they said they will slowly phase it out. i wonder if there will be anymore crash... or crashes.

may - as we grow older... death of friends will come to us... facts of life unfortunately.

jaezrel - apa la u... tiba tiba said he good looking pulak.

narrowband - i think 3 years is too long though.

AngryYoungChild - no worries.

neno - it's a name for one of our military helicopters... very very old helicopters.

water-angel - was it also another nuri crash? sigh... it's claiming too many lives. we must put them to the ground immediately.

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Cocka Doodle said...

It's not just the choppers that are falling off the skies. A number of our MiG fighters crashed too, and they aren't that old.

I deal with the Navy and I know what sort of 'irregularities' go on in there when it comes to maintenance and procurement of parts and I'm not surprise the same holds for the air force.

Sorry about your friend.

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Rashikaps said...

So sorry to hear about your friend and the others. May they all rest in peace.

Life is truly short.

zewt said...

rinnah - thanks for the award!! love it!

Cocka Doodle - I've also checked with one of my friends who works for GE Engineerin... well, we all know what's going on ler.

whisperindshout - i charge for advertisement u know haha!

Rashikaps - thanks... indeed, let us all live it to the fullest!

white_daisies said...

He sounds like a great kid. I agree, nothing is more attractive than a self-made man.

Sheena said...

My friend's father died in a helicopter crash in Sarawak. Even though he was an MP, and was travelling with a few other big-shots (all of whom passed away), for some reason, they blamed the weather, the wind, the virgin jungle, the fact it's the interior of Sarawak... Nuri helicopters were still certified safe for flying.

3 months later, another crash happened.

Like you say, they happen as often as the haze, and just as much action - or rather just as little action 0 is taken to prevent either from happening.

Horny Ang Moh said...

Sorry to hear that it is ur friend. RIP! ( I am itchy to get home to my 'hor ny' computer to s what is ur latest post as ur site barred against by holy office computer ) Have a nice day!

ClaudiaMom said...

So sorry to hear about your friend. May his soul rest in peace.

XRNH said...

i cant help but getting angry whenever this Nuri news came upon me.. i mean, i just dont get it? how long do they intend to play this game and ignore the fact that Nuri is no longer the reliable machine? to think that they actually spent millions on stupid activities such as terjunan bebas at the north pole and all that yet cannot find a new machine and put this Nuri on obsolete term. Crazy la these people. Agaknya, kena denkat their own relatives baru nak terhegeh-hegeh.. benci...

may all of them rest in peace. amin.

flaminglambo said...

This shits me.

Then again, why should the Minister of Defence give a crap. His government is still going to be elected anyway. No repercussions cos' he's one of the untouchables.

R.I.P

~aSstHa~ said...

so sorry to hear about your friend and those who went down with him. may they rest in peace n may God give the family strength in their time of need. (dunno if dat sounded right)

Am ignorant tho and never read papers so don't know much bout what's goin on n all.

Jz to save myself from further stress. oh well... not really in the mood to write much of a comment. take care n hv a pleasant weekend.

Jorji said...

nuri masih lagi boleh digunakan...
tapi didalam MUZIUM la!

nuri is just another case...bila pulak pemimpin kita ni berakal,berotak,berfikir?

jarang-jarang.kadang-kadang.

sensitif?

TIADA.

Jonzz said...

Sorry to hear about your friend.

How true. Deaths have become just numbers and statistics in newspapers until you realize you have a connection to the victim.

Ehon said...

zewt, sorry to hear that.. hmm.. and yes, there is something seriously wrong with the system!

zewt said...

white_daisies - he is... a very good friend too.

Sheena - this really makes me wonder how many crashes will happen in the next 3 years. nuris should be grounded immediately.

hor ny - haha... you will laugh your ass off i tell u.

Tina Hussain - azlan was buried yest, too bad i missed the funeral. let hope his sacrifice will be the last.

flaminglambo - i guess that's why. RIP for azlan.

aSstHa - yeah, his family will certainly mourn his death. let him be the last.

jorji - eh... beraninya kamu bercakap demikian... :)

Jonzz - like i said, let's hope his sacrifice will be the last. no one deserves to die from this.

ehon - very wrong perhaps.

Anonymous said...

i mean blackout from the decepticons

CRIZ LAI said...

When I saw the news, it was like "What? Again?" After so many crashes, why was there no immediate attention given to study what are the reasons behind such frequent crashes? It's time for the Government to change all the helicopters. No wonder the MHA shares never go up...LOL

Anyway, my deepest condolences to the families of those crashed victims. May their souls be at peace!

Anonymous said...

Its similar to the case with Hornbill Skyways...Tht's helicopters used to travel to the interior parts of Sarawak and to oil rigs too...and those heli's falling from the sky not an unfrequent event too.I think water_angel above mentioned about ba kelalan crash...it was a Hornbill Skyways chopper I think...that was the most tragic.There were others before that and after that but I don't really know the stats...but it is horrific that they were still allowed to fly!!! I even wrote about it for my Ethics paper along the line of politics and cover-ups being reasons why they're not grounded for the crashes..and I believe its d same wit the Nuris...and there's nothing we can do but pray that they will be grounded and lower the risks of such a thing happening again. I have not heard anythin on Hornbill Skyways for a long time now...hopefully that means the heli's had been grounded...hope the Nuris grounded ASAP too...

May they all rest in peace.Amen.

choulyin.tan said...

yup, also a nuri crash =(

Anonymous said...

Yes, it was sad Azlan died. I went to the house for the funeral. It was like a Bukit Damansara Primary reunion, Class of 1990.

Anonymous said...

they would rather spend millions and millions to send some 'angkasawan' to the space than replacing these worn out helicopters.....wat a sad story.....

zewt said...

cibol - i see... not an apache. looks like an airwolf! haha...

criz lai - i think they conducted some investigation but like all other issues... it died out in time. let's hope we will not adopt the same approach for this one.

mar - slowly being phased in 3 years they say... let's hope there will be no more crashes...

water-angel - sorry to hear that. but mar above said it may be a hornbill skyways. let's hope there will be no more.

Anwar M - too bad i couldnt make it for the burial... got a last minute call and i was working. hope he understands.

cyen - that is so damn true. but then again... when they purchase a new fleet of choppers... u know what will happen also ler.