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Did software kill soldiers?

By Leon Engelbrecht, ITWeb senior writer
Johannesburg, 16 Oct 2007

The National Defence Force is probing whether a software glitch led to an antiaircraft cannon malfunction that killed nine soldiers and seriously injured 14 others during a shooting exercise on Friday.

SA National Defence Force spokesman brigadier general Kwena Mangope says the cause of the malfunction is not yet known and will be determined by a Board of Inquiry. The police are conducting a separate investigation into the incident.

Media reports say the shooting exercise, using live ammunition, took place at the SA Army's Combat Training Centre, at Lohatlha, in the Northern Cape, as part of an annual force preparation endeavour.

Mangope told The Star that it “is assumed that there was a mechanical problem, which led to the accident. The gun, which was fully loaded, did not fire as it normally should have," he said. "It appears as though the gun, which is computerised, jammed before there was some sort of explosion, and then it opened fire uncontrollably, killing and injuring the soldiers."

Other reports have suggested a computer error might have been to blame. Defence pundit Helmoed-Römer Heitman told the Weekend Argus that if “the cause lay in computer error, the reason for the tragedy might never be found”.

Electronics engineer and defence company CEO Richard Young says he can't believe the incident was purely a mechanical fault. He says his company, C²I²,in the mid 1990s, was involved in two air defence artillery upgrade programmes, dubbed Projects Catchy and Dart.

Software details

During the shooting trials at Armscor's Alkantpan shooting range, “I personally saw a gun go out of control several times,” Young says. “They made a temporary rig consisting of two steel poles on each side of the weapon, with a rope in between to keep the weapon from swinging. The weapon eventually knocked the polls down.”

Young says he was also told at the time that the gun's original equipment manufacturer, Oerlikon, had warned that the GDF Mk V twin 35mm cannon system was not designed for fully automatic control. Yet the guns were automated. At the time, SA was still subject to an arms embargo and Oerlikon played no role in the upgrade.

“If I was an engineer on the Board of Inquiry, I would ask for all details about the software for the fire control system and gun drives,” Young says. “If it was not a mechanical or operating system error, you must find out which company developed the software and did the upgrade.”

Young says in the 1990s the defence force's acquisitions agency, Armscor, allocated project money on a year-by-year basis, meaning programmes were often rushed. “It would not surprise me if major shortcuts were taken in the qualification of the upgrades. A system like that should never fail to the dangerous mode [rather to the safe mode], except if it was a shoddy design or a shoddy modification.

“I think there have been multiple failures here; in software and the absence of interlocking safeguards.” He asks if the guns were given arcs of fire and whether these were enforced with electromechanical end stops. “On a firing range you don't want guns to fire through 360 degrees.”

Oerlikon's local agent, Intertechnic, did not respond to requests for comment. The SANDF said investigations were still under way.

The air defence artillery will, in the next two years, receive new missiles, radar and computer-based fire control equipment worth R3 billion as part of projects Guardian and Protector.

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observing said:

Die onderstaande verklaring van Dewald Visser baie duidelik onderstreep die feit dat Altech Defence Systems en later African Defence Systems (ADS) se enigste doelwit was om geld te maak. In die latere jare van my indiensneming daar, was dit ook vir my baie duidelik dat ADS inherent krimineel was (en nog steeds is ? verwys na Arms Deal Scandal). Die onderstaande berig waarop Dr Richard Young kommentaar lewer is na aanleiding van ?n ongeluk op ?n stelsel waar ADS vroeer op gewerk het. Die vraag is: het ADS, soos in die geval van die missiel stelsels, ook die tegniese integriteit nagelaat vir geldelike gewin?

TO WHOM IT MAY CONCERN

I, Dewald Visser, with ID.no. 59110065003082 hereby declare on this 21st day of February 2002 as follows:

This declaration is given in such a way as to show the relevant detail with regards to the case of Mr. Fritz Louw.

I worked at the company now known as African Defence Systems (ADS) from May 1987 (then known as Teklogic) until the end of June 1997 (then known as Altech Defence Systems).

During the last 4 years of my employment with ADS I was a member of the senior management team of the company occupying the post of divisional manager of the Anti-Aircraft Gun Systems Division and during the last nine months as Technical Manager of the company.

During the period as Divisional Manager I was operating on the same level as Mr. Alberto Sartini who was the Anti-Aircraft Missile Systems divisional manager.

The senior management of the company consisted of the Managing Director, Mr. Johan Kleynhans, the Financial Director (Mr Francois Conradie, then Mr Mike Raw and during the last six months of my employment this position was filled temporarily (by a person whose name I cannot recall) the Divisional Managers (Mr Sartini, Mr. Heiberg, Mr. Beukes, Mr Van der Walt, Mr Acres and myself), the Human Resource Manager (Mrs Van Zyl) and the Operational Manager (Mr. Strachan).

The way in which the company was managed created an immense amount of stress and this eventually culminated as one of the reasons why I had resigned.

The company was managed in a total autocratic fashion by Mr. Kleynhans and Mr. Strachan with their first priorities being their own careers. The management meetings were mostly just a feedback session of what had to be done financially and conveyed to the managers. Technically very few of the managers were properly qualified to do their jobs, least of all Mr.Strachan who was in charge of operations (and also my direct boss) and very few decisions that were crucial to the projects were ever taken and if taken it sometimes took more than three months to get a decision. This put tremendous strain on project schedules which in turn put strain on the project teams who were forced to perform to what management wanted in terms of schedule and cost. If anybody in the company tried to reasonably oppose Mr. Strachan and/or Mr. Kleynhans, they were either sidelined or basically forced to resign. Unfortunately most of the management team were also only interested in their own careers and therefore did very little to protect the rest of the workforce.

Mr. Strachan & Kleynhans only concentrated on bottomline figures and due to their indecisiveness in general, most of the projects were totally understaffed and under-equipped which further put strain on the project staff.

Their reporting to higher management at that stage, the Altech Executive meeting, was a total misrepresentation of facts. We used to submit our project forecasts on a monthly basis. If these forecasts, which normally indicated the true statuses of the projects, did not meet Mr. Kleynhans and Strachan?s expectations, it was simply changed, by for instance playing around with work-in-process and stock levels to suit them. I once came back from an overseas marketing trip to find that my whole budget had been changed to such an extent that I refused to go to the Executive meeting as I was not prepared to accept responsibility for this kind of manipulation of figures. This was the beginning of the demise of my position in the company as they were scared that I would (and I would have) informed Altech of the true state of affairs. They then made me technical manager of the company where I had very little insight in the financial aspects and managing of the company. At some stage we registered a technology project with the Altech Technology Fund administered by Dr. Jacobsen for a project that was already completed on previous funding. To use the words of Mr. Strachan ?We must breathe through somebody else?s lungs). I was aware of two cases where ARMSCOR was invoiced for milestones on a project that was nowhere near completion.

I was once part of a disciplinary process involving one of the employees that worked for me. Everything was arranged beforehand including the services of the so-called industrial psychologist that was fully briefed, before the interview with the employee, of what our objectives were and what we wanted from this interview.

The biggest problem in my opinion in this company was Mr. Strachan who was one of the best manipulators and political players I had ever come across. He never made any operational decision and always arranged any situation that either the person involved (other than himself) or Mr.Kleynhans in the extreme would be the responsible person should anything happen. He made no contribution to the operations of the company and in fact was an extremely frustrating personality who hampered literally every constructive move.

It is my opinion that Mr. Louw was driven to a very frustrated and aggravated state by at least Mr. Strachan and as I know Mr. Louw personally as a calm, reserved and introvert type person with a lot of integrity I can only imagine to what extent they must have gone to aggravate him. It is also my opinion that as I know Mr. Louw he aired his grievances first verbally, then by means of several letters to first Mr. Sartini and then to Mr. Strachan and before he could go any further he was very swiftly dealt with as the whole issue would be an embarrasment. Very little true facts that could possibly tarnish Mr. Strachan?s image ever got past him. I myself after the incident where they changed my budget as described above, went to the Managing Director, Mr Kleynhans, and as stated the demise of my position started overnight.

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D.Visser

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October 18, 2007 Votes: +0