Prosecutors have defied calls for a fatal accident inquiry into the deaths of three RAF air men in a mid-air collision between two fighter jets
The Crown Office said in a statement there was no need for a court hearing to ascertain the full facts of the tragedy, involving Tornado aircraft, over the Moray Firth in July 2012.
The collision, during a training exercise, claimed the lives of RAF colleagues Hywel Tomos Poole, Samuel Edward Bailey and Adam Mark Sanders.
The Crown Office said the Ministry of Defence's Service Inquiry Report, published on 30 June 2014, had been very thorough.
Moray SNP MP Angus Robertson, who is also the party's defence spokesman, has led calls for a fatal accident inquiry.
Mr Robertson, whose constituency includes the victims' RAF Lossiemouth base said: "This is an extremely disappointing decision. I am totally mystified why there won't be a Fatal Accident Inquiry.
"There are critical outstanding questions about Tornado safety and the delayed collision warning system.
"The MoD failed in its duty of care towards the RAF personnel involved in the Tornado collision.
"I believe they, their families and colleagues deserved better and a proper inquiry."
But the Crown said the MoD had concluded that difficulties in operating with a split squadron - half of the squadron being then based in Cyprus - the lack of procedures to achieve deconfliction at the flight briefing stage, as well as the failures to have a working Secondary Surveillance Radar on the day of the collision may have been to blame.
It also exposed the fact that one of the two aircraft did not have a working Radar Homing and Warning Receiver that day.
All of the Service Inquiry's recommendations have been accepted by the MoD, it added, and were being implemented.
This included the installation of collision warning systems.
The Crown Office said: "After thorough consideration of the circumstances of the case, Crown Counsel have concluded that all the relevant issues have been comprehensively examined in the course of the Military Aviation Authority report and could not have been better considered in any FAI"
It added an FAI "would only duplicate the months of thorough work undertaken by the Military Air Accident Investigation Branch and the Military Aviation Authority in preparing the Service Inquiry.
"As a result, Crown Counsel have instructed that no FAI is to be held."
David Green, Head of the Scottish Fatalities Investigation Unit, said: "Crown Counsel carefully weighed up the full circumstances of the case, and concluded that a Fatal Accident Inquiry could not better and would only repeat the highly detailed investigation into the tragedy already conducted by the Military Aviation Authority.
"The (MoD) Service Inquiry Report which they produced also contains conclusions and recommendations which are more wide ranging than could be expected to be achieved in a Fatal Accident Inquiry.
"The RAF and MOD have accepted the recommendations of the Service Inquiry Report, and the nearest relatives of those who tragically died in this accident have been advised of Crown Counsel's decision."
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article