FEATURES c Men
capture or kill a high-value target. B Company of the second battalion of the Parachute Regiment boarded a Hercules at RAF Leeming where a joint British-French force was working as part of Capable Eagle.
RAF Air Loadmaster Sgt Gavin Livingstone said: “We like working with the Paras. They are very good at what they do on the ground but are happy to place themselves in our care when it comes to parachuting.”
flight the Hercules carries Air Survival Rescue Apparatus, supplementary kit which includes a multi-seat life raft which can be dropped to those in need.
Wg Cdr Martin Rose, OC 905 EAW explains the role of the Hercules in long- range search and rescue: “They are all-weather, day-night capable and incredibly good. To give an indication of the SAR capability a fishing vessel 300 miles north of us needed assistance so steamed south until it got within range when we launched the Sea King.
“In really bad weather, low cloud and quite choppy conditions, the Sea King met the vessel about 200 miles out. The C-130 was airborne above as top cover and identified the vessel, provided a radio relay and coordinated the helicopter on to the vessel.”
“Luckily we had a Spanish speaker aboard the C-130 who was controlling the boat. The crew did a superb job and extracted the casualty and brought him back to King Edward VII Memorial Hospital in Stanley. A superb combined joint endeavour for which the Sea King crew and the translator received a Commander’s Commendation and the Hercules crew a Commander’s Certificate of Merit.”
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For the aircrew who fly on detachment for four weeks at a time, the Falklands provide an excellent training environment which includes air-air refuelling, low-level and night-flying.
FS Addison continues:
“There’s no cultural lighting in the Falklands which means when you’re night-flying you don’t get the definition of the terrain or a definite horizon so the aircrew have to work a lot harder. There are few areas in the UK where we could do this but here we don’t have the airspace restrictions we have in the UK. There are, for example, hardly any masts or wind turbines.”
With an air-refuelling tanker available the opportunity is taken not only to refresh the skills of the Hercules crews on detachment but also to train crews converting to the type. Air-Air Refuelling is high intensity work for the pilots, flying in close formation demands maximum concentration and subtle movement of flying controls.
In another scenario, when an exercise or operation calls for crack troops to be delivered with pinpoint accuracy they call on the RAF Herc fleet.
This was the case on Exercise Capable Eagle when a tasking came through for Paras to
Fifty-one soldiers, led by Maj Adam Wilson, filed onto a C-130J of 47 Sqn in Overhead Assault Mode, meaning they were jumping in body armour, webbing and with weapon at their sides with extra equipment, in daysacks, strapped to their legs.
Poor weather, including gusting winds at the Wiley Sike drop zone (DZ), part of RAF Spadeadam, Cumbria, was a constant threat to the task and the Hercules had to climb from its low-level approach as cloud threatened the pilot’s visibility.
The plan was to find a gap in the weather nearer to the DZ. The ploy worked and while the Paras hooked up their static lines and were checked by a team of four Parachute Jump Instructors (PJI) the aircraft dropped to jumping height.
Five passes later at 600ft and B Company was on the ground and moving into the next phase of its task while the C-130J hugged the ground on its return to Leeming.
The PJI in charge of the drop, Sgt Gaz Charnock, of the RAF’s 1 Parachute Training School, was on the phone to the DZ as soon as the aircraft landed. He said: “It’s good to hear that all of the lads landed safely and that there are no broken bones.”
Envoy Winter 2013 17
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