Army's new helicopters can't fire

An embarrassed Ministry of Defence has admitted that the Army's new multi-billion pound Apache attack helicopters are unable to fire their anti-tank missiles - for fear of causing serious damage or even forcing the aircraft to crash.

Whitehall papers leaked to newspapers confirm that debris ejected whenever the Longbow Apache WAH-64D tankbusters fire their Hellfire missiles is thought to be capable of damaging the main or tail rotors and bringing down the helicopters.

The Army has ordered 67 Longbow Apaches with the aim of forming the vanguard of the new British Army Air Cavalry. They are being built in Britain by Westland Helicopters at Yeovil, Somerset, at a cost of £27 million each. The MoD report reveals: "A problem has been identified with the Hellfire rocket involving damage to the aircraft from motor debris on firing. We are working to find solutions."

The problem has already become apparent in the US where pilots are under orders to launch only the starboard-mounted missilesto avoid the port-side Hellfire's threat to the tail rotor. Each 227mph Apache carries eight Rockwell Hellfires - with a range of 5.6 miles - mounted in pods of four on either side of the aircraft.

This is just the latest scare involving the new model Apache, chosen by the MoD ahead of the GEC-Bell Cobra Venom and a successor to the original Apaches that were first used in the US invasion of Panama City in 1989 and Operation Desert Storm during the 1991 Gulf War.

In Afghanistan five out of the seven Apaches sent to attack al Qaeda terrorists during the recent US Operation Anaconda were disabled by machinegun fire or elderly Soviet-made rocket-propelled grenades fired from the ground.

Dust and sand are also reported to be impairing the helicopters' engines. The introduction of the first operational Apache squadron to the Army Air Corps has already been delayed for eight months by software problems with the simulator used to train pilots.

And it is only the latest of a series of equipment problems to embarrass the MoD. After it consistently jammed on operations in Kosovo and Sierra Leone, the Army's SA80 rifle had to be modified at a cost of £80 million.

Soldiers in the Balkans were forced to use their mobile phones to contact each other when the 12-year Bowman project to replace Army radio sets which dated back to the 1982 Falklands conflict was abandoned 18 months ago.

A Ministry of Defence spokeswoman said today the Apache is "not due on-line until August 2004. We hope the problem will be resolved by then".