{"id":80,"date":"2012-03-02T16:09:28","date_gmt":"2012-03-02T16:09:28","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/user39678.vs.easily.co.uk\/?p=80"},"modified":"2024-01-10T09:17:37","modified_gmt":"2024-01-10T09:17:37","slug":"a-glimpse-of-the-future","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rowlandwhite.com\/?p=80","title":{"rendered":"A GLIMPSE OF THE FUTURE"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"On the 7th<\/sup> of May 1909, during the brief reign of Queen Victoria\u2019s eldest son, King Edward VII, the British Admiralty placed an order for their first aircraft, His Majesty\u2019s Airship Number One.\u00a0 I\u2019ll be watching with particular interest as the Royal Navy celebrates the Centenary of that event, and with it the birth of naval aviation, throughout 2009.\u00a0 For the last two years I\u2019ve been working on a new book, Phoenix Squadron<\/em>, about, perhaps, the most famous name ever associated with the British naval air power, HMS Ark Royal<\/em>, and her role in confronting the threat of a Guatemalan invasion of British Honduras \u2013 now Belize \u2013 in 1972.\u00a0 While this little known crisis provided the focus for my efforts, the book also explores a much bigger story: that of the Fleet Air Arm itself.<\/p>\n

In the summer of 1971, the fourth ship to bear the name Ark Royal <\/em>was destined soon to become the Navy\u2019s last conventional aircraft carrier.\u00a0 Her sister ship, HMS Eagle<\/em> was to be paid of in January of the following year.\u00a0 Ark Royal<\/em>, given a reprieve after a change of government in 1970, was to soldier on until 1978, but it felt like a last throw of the dice.\u00a0 Her fighter squadron, 892 Naval Air Squadron, wore the Omega symbol on the red-painted tails of their McDonnell Douglas Phantom FG1s.<\/p>\n

But while Britain\u2019s aircraft carriers may have been unloved by her politicians and all but Navy personnel within the MoD, Ark Royal<\/em>, at least, enjoyed the support, fascination and affection of the public.\u00a0 And, at the beginning of August 1971, before once more steaming north to guard NATO\u2019s Northern flank, she had the opportunity to give her admirers a glimpse of what she was capable of.\u00a0 As the 50,000 ton carrier steamed off the Devon and Dorset coast, the BBC was coming aboard for Exercise LYMELIGHT.\u00a0 Over an afternoon, for the benefit of the Corporation\u2019s cameras, Ark<\/em>\u2019s \u2018heavies\u2019 would attack a wooden \u2018splash target\u2019 towed behind the ship with bombs and 2\u201d rockets.\u00a0 The Buccaneers would toss Lepus flares into the air for the Phantoms to use as targets for AIM-9 Sidewinder heat-seeking missiles while BBC cameramen captured the drama on film from the flight deck.\u00a0 The choice of who should present this landmark outside broadcast, \u2018At Sea with the Navy\u2019, was always an obvious one.<\/p>\n

Raymond Baxter was a distinguished wartime Spitfire pilot who had subsequently carved out a name for himself as the face of the BBC\u2019s coverage of the Farnborough Air Show and presenter of Tomorrow\u2019s World<\/em>.\u00a0 The night before the LYMELIGHT began he visited Lieutenant Commander Carl Davis, the CO of 809 NAS, Ark<\/em>\u2019s Buccaneer squadron, in his cabin, intrigued by how Fleet Air Arm aircrew endured the physical stresses of catapult launches.\u00a0 Davis played it down.<\/p>\n

\u2018It\u2019s fine,\u2019 he told Baxter, \u2018Surely the most efficient way of getting airborne \u2013 you don\u2019t need a long runway, no burst tyres \u2026\u2019 A gentle dig at his land-based RAF contemporaries.<\/p>\n

\u2018But how do you cope?\u2019<\/p>\n

\u2018You get used to it\u2019<\/p>\n

\u2018But 16 g<\/em> \u2026\u2019 Baxter countered.\u00a0 Davis\u2019s eyes widened.\u00a0 He couldn\u2019t let that go.<\/p>\n

\"\"\u2018I beg your pardon?\u2019\u00a0 Davis asked.\u00a0 Baxter, the old Spitfire pilot, was sure that the catapult subjected the crews to 16 g \u2013 that during launch they\u2019d weigh 16 times their normal body weight.<\/p>\n

\u2018No it\u2019s about 3 or 4, maybe 5g depending on the wind.\u2019<\/p>\n

\u2018It can\u2019t be, you\u2019d never fly!\u2019\u00a0 Baxter wasn\u2019t having any of it.\u00a0 Davis could only hope someone would put him straight before he began his commentary.\u00a0 The truth is that Baxter wasn\u2019t entirely<\/em> wide of the mark, but any really high g loads were momentary, experienced for a split-second as the catapult fired, before the acceleration down the track became smoother.<\/p>\n

Lieutenant Commander Nick Kerr, Davis\u2019s counterpart on the Phantom squadron didn\u2019t really have any time for the idea of showboating for the BBC.\u00a0 When Kerr was barely six or seven, his Grandmother maintained that \u2018Little Nicky will be an Admiral.\u2019\u00a0 Kerr was too ready to speak his mind for that<\/em> to be likely, but the same fierce independence that made him a handful for his superiors was also one of his great strengths as a fighter pilot and squadron boss.<\/p>\n

Kerr\u2019s predecessor, 892\u2019s first CO as a Phantom squadron, had had to spend much of his time ironing out the inevitable snags that accompanied any new aircraft\u2019s introduction into service.\u00a0 Perhaps the worst distraction had been trying to bring the troublesome and unreliable Rolls-Royce Spey engines up to scratch.\u00a0 892 had even become the proud possessors of a Rolls-Royce Silver Shadow as a thank you from the grateful engine manufacturer for the squadron\u2019s help and patience.\u00a0 Kerr couldn\u2019t help feeling a tinge of relief when the bloody thing had been written-off by one of his Observers after a tyre blew out on a fast corner.<\/p>\n

With most serious of the mechanical hurdles behind them, Kerr was determined to focus on making sure that big Phantom was as effective and powerful a weapon as it had the potential to be.\u00a0 Ark<\/em>\u2019s Air Group of multi-role F-4s, Buccaneers, Gannet AEW3s and state-of-the-art Westland Sea King anti-submarine helicopters was, relative to its size, probably the most capable and modern air force in Europe.\u00a0 For the first time in its existence, the Fleet Air Arm was flying a collection of aircraft that were genuinely a match for anything else in the sky.\u00a0 And they knew it.<\/p>\n

After their squadrons had delivered an impressive display of airpower on the afternoon of August 4th<\/sup> \u2013 marred only by a Sidewinder missile that hit the sea before it had properly locked on to the target flare \u2013 neither Kerr nor Davis was in the mood to be too taken with LYMELIGHT\u2019s finale: the little Royal Air Force Hawker Siddeley Harrier GR1 jump-jet that visited Ark<\/em> as the exercise drew to a close.<\/p>\n

With every spare vantage point on Ark<\/em>\u2019s island stuffed with \u2018Goofers\u2019 watching the spectacle, the 1(Fighter) Squadron Harrier, approached slowly from behind the ship, its weight carried by the roaring Rolls-Royce Pegasus inside her.\u00a0 Safely above the deck, the pilot cut the power to bring her in to land vertically.\u00a0 With a heavy bounce, the camouflaged jet skitted on the deck before her pilot increased power again, swivelled the four engine nozzles backwards and jumped forward, rolling a short distance across the deck before leaping into air.\u00a0 This flourish was as unexpected as it was entertaining.\u00a0 And, watching it all from the Flyco bridge extension overhead, Raymond Baxter was beside himself with glee.<\/p>\n

\u2018Saucy!\u2019 he exclaimed \u2018Saucy indeed!\u2019<\/p>\n

\"\"Davis and Kerr were rather less enamoured with the RAF\u2019s star performer.\u00a0 Next to the capability offered by the Phantoms and Buccaneers, it just felt to them like second best.\u00a0 Too small, they believed, to carry a useful load, and too short-legged to carry it any distance.\u00a0 But with the end of the Navy\u2019s big conventional carriers now a certainty with Ark<\/em>\u2019s eventual retirement, in the Harrier, the Admiralty saw a lifeline; the only fast jet capable of surviving the slow death of their conventional carriers.\u00a0 As the decision not to replace the carriers had been made in the late \u2019sixties, a model of a Harrier had appeared on the desk of the First Sea Lord.\u00a0 And, in 1971, at the British Aircraft Corporation facility at Dunsfold in Surrey, studies for a naval version of the Harrier were already underway.<\/p>\n

As he watched from the Bridge, Ark<\/em>\u2019s Captain, John Roberts, was also less dismissive of the little vertical take off jet than his two Squadron bosses.\u00a0 There was something there, he realised.\u00a0 The Harrier was robust, well suited to operations at sea and, crucially, offered the possibility of recovering aboard without the need for the ship to turn into wind.\u00a0 It would be real bonus for flying operations in rough sea.\u00a0 And this could<\/em>, he noted presciently, be very significant<\/em>.\u00a0 The Fleet Air Arm, he thought, could do a lot worse than taking the Harrier.<\/p>\n

John Roberts was proved right.\u00a0 Ten years later, with Ark<\/em> long gone, when Argentina invaded the Falkland Islands, the new-into-service Sea Harrier FRS1s (and later RAF Harrier GR3s) were all we had.\u00a0\u00a0 While the contribution that might have been made by Ark Royal<\/em> and her squadrons of Phantoms and Buccaneers has been a subject of endless debate, the job done by the V\/STOL jets is unarguable, and came as a surprise to many observers.\u00a0 Reliable, tough and capable of operating from the light carriers HMS Hermes<\/em> and HMS Invincible<\/em> in weather that Commander \u2018Sharkey\u2019 Ward, then boss of 801 NAS, has maintained would have kept the Phantoms and Buccaneers lashed to the deck, the Sea Harriers proved crucial to victory.\u00a0 Despite a lack of airborne early warning and fighter control, supersonic speed, pulse-doppler radar or medium-range missiles, the little V\/STOL fighters shot down twenty-three enemy aircraft without suffering a single air combat loss in return.\u00a0 There\u2019s no question that, without the Harriers, the British simply could not have retaken the Islands.<\/p>\n

The Harrier has since gone on to be one of the Fleet Air Arm\u2019s most enduring and successful frontline aircraft.\u00a0 And, in its GR7\/GR9 form, remains in service with the Naval Strike Wing, alongside the RAF, within Joint Force Harrier today.<\/p>\n

As plans stand, the Harrier, dismissed so early in its development as being barely capable of carrying \u2018a matchbox across a football field\u2019 will remain in service until middle of the decade until finally replaced by the F-35 Lightning II Joint Strike Fighter.\u00a0 And when those new fifth-generation jets enter service alongside two new 65,000 ton carriers, HMS Queen Elizabeth<\/em> and HMS Prince of Wales<\/em> the Royal Navy can finally, after a gap of nearly thirty years, claim to have found the true heirs to the fourth Ark Royal<\/em>.\u00a0 For now though, she, with her Air Group, continues to be the most powerful surface warship this country has ever put to sea.<\/p>\n

Written March 2009<\/em><\/em><\/p>\n

Phoenix Squadron: HMS Ark Royal, Britain\u2019s Last Top Guns and the Untold Story of their most Dramatic Mission<\/em> by Rowland White is published by Bantam Press, in hardback, priced at \u00a318.99<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

On the 7th of May 1909, during the brief reign of Queen Victoria\u2019s eldest son, King Edward VII, the British Admiralty placed an order for their first aircraft, His Majesty\u2019s Airship Number One.\u00a0 I\u2019ll be watching with particular interest as the Royal Navy celebrates the Centenary of that event, and with it the birth of Continue Reading<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":354,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-80","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-articles","cat-5-id"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rowlandwhite.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/80","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rowlandwhite.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rowlandwhite.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rowlandwhite.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rowlandwhite.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=80"}],"version-history":[{"count":15,"href":"https:\/\/www.rowlandwhite.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/80\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":703,"href":"https:\/\/www.rowlandwhite.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/80\/revisions\/703"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rowlandwhite.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/354"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rowlandwhite.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=80"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rowlandwhite.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=80"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rowlandwhite.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=80"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}