Qinetiq chief executive quits one day after critical RAF Nimrod crash report
THE chief executive of defence research business Qinetiq, Graham Love, stood down yesterday – a day after the company was heavily criticised in a report into the fatal RAF Nimrod aircraft crash in 2006.
Love, who was with Qinetiq for eight years, will leave on 30 November but remains as a consultant to the group. He is being replaced by Leo Quinn, the former chief executive of bank note printer De La Rue.
A spokesman for Qinetiq said the management change was unconnected to the Nimrod report. “The board has been in succession planning for over a year,” he said.
On Wednesday aviation lawyer Charles Haddon-Cave published the findings of his 20-month review into the disaster, which killed 14 servicemen. The report identified “manifold shortcomings in the UK military airworthiness and in-service support regime”.
It criticised 10 individuals from the Ministry of Defence, BAE Systems and Qinetiq, which it labelled “lax” for failing to read BAE’s reports or check its work properly.