HMS Eagle 1967 Commission

Wonderful photographs. They bring back memories of reading my father’s eagerly awaited issues of Flight Deck. Shiny paper and beautiful pictures. He also served with 703 Trials Squadron at Ford on Attackers,re the interesting if indistinct photo in this thread.

Looking critically at the Sea Vixen/condensation flash picture makes me think it may be a montage or photoshopped. It doesn’t quite hang together.

Everything I’ve read was that V would still have been operating Sea Vixens upon replacement in 1972, as she simply would not have been able to be sufficiently modified for Phantoms (insufficient room for catapults of sufficient length, etc).

Hi AK: That is a most useful summary of events. Thanks.

Gerry R #14 – anti-carrier Labour Govt.

Wilson’s (HW) lot got in 16/10/64, same day as China’s A-Test. Inherited RN Plan was: 52 F-4K for Victorious/Ark/Eagle; to be replaced by CVAs (V from 1972, R, 1977, J 1984-ish). 30 Buccaneer S.2 were on order, more sought; 23 Red Beard Mk.2 A-Bombs on hand, Improved Kiloton Bomb in development (to be WE.177A). 5 SSBNs Planned, possibly to include Indian O. patrols.

India’s PM Shastri visited HW 3/12/64 as part of a wide foray seeking a nuclear Guarantee against China. HW visited LBJ 8/12/64 to ease Defence Budget: HW deflected US lures to enter SE.Asia; did agree to remain in SEATO and to retain UK’s nuclear contribution (which then was 45 Sqd/Tengah (Red Beard) and a CV (Scimitar or Buccaneer S.1/Red Beard) normally available on FE Station). LBJ offered the credit package which led to F-4M, C-130K and Option F-111K.

6/4/65, he chopped TSR.2 and took 40 strike F-111K on option for NEAF/FEAF with the Improved Kiloton Bomb. 17/5/65, he initiated AFVG/RN, 10/65 bought 17 more Buccaneer S.2s, all for the CVAs.

India abandoned notions of friends’ nuclear umbrella and embarked on the process where today she has a blue water nuclear Power Projection capability. HW continued to permit RN to explore Indian O. patrols for 1 of the 4 confirmed SSBNs (that lingered into 1968).

Parlous UK finances caused CVA/AFVG/RN chop 22/2/66; he ordered 30 more Buccaneer S.2 4/66 and soon 66 WE.177A (maybe 30 for the Buccs, the others as NDBs). So thus it was as Eagle began its FE Commission of this thread (8/67 – 6/68). China fired its H-Bomb 17/7/67. Money, again, caused F-111K chop 1/68, announcement of UK withdrawal from East of Suez by 1971; reduction of CV to 1, which settled on R to avoid J refit for F-4K.

Wilson‘s lot were neither anti-carrier nor anti-help to SEATO (1965 Defence White Paper: “nuclear policy must help to provide some reassurance to out-of-Nato-area non-nuclear Powers”). They were broke.

I was on ” Eagle ” with 804 Squadron, Seahawks, in 1954-55 and have quite a few photos of this era. ” Winkle ” Brown was our CO. I will see if I can post photos of this time. 802 also Seahawks, 813 Wyverns, 849 Gannets, 845 Whirwinds.

As I’ve said before, bleeming, a photographic contribution from yourself would be very welcome (especially of Wyverns :applause:)

Rob

Yes indeed, that was the gist of my conversation with Stan.

Moggy

k, or face burried in

.

Who dreamed that one up?

I believe there was some truth that the early radar scopes gave poor resolution (tough to see) in sun light, so it was deemed appropriate to have the Nav in a dark space, or have a hood over the radar scope that the Nav could peer into. So either in the dark, or face burried in the hood. I am sure the nav would much rather have a good view for the the 90+% of the time they were not peering into the scope

More importantly who had the stupid idea that the nav’s window had to be blanked out so that he couldn’t cheat on his navigation. It was down by his right knee for goodness sake, he’d have to have been a contortionist to see out of it and at the speed they’d have been travelling it would have been little use anyway.

I met up last week with a guy who had been the Nav on Sea Vixen.

He really wasn’t very complimentary about ‘the coal hole’

Surprisingly it seemed the pilots never showed much in the way of sympathy for the poor sod stuck in there.

Who dreamed that one up?

Moggy

Cracking photos. Thanks for sharing them. Love the Bucc being thrown into the air.

I was on ” Eagle ” with 804 Squadron, Seahawks, in 1954-55 and have quite a few photos of this era. ” Winkle ” Brown was our CO. I will see if I can post photos of this time. 802 also Seahawks, 813 Wyverns, 849 Gannets, 845 Whirwinds.

Great images 🙂

Just as an aside, do you happen to have any pictures of any of the escort ships by any chance? My old man was on a destroyer called Caprice (D01) which I think may have been in Cape Town in ’67, just wondering if she accompanied Eagle on this trip.

May be of relevance to this thread but it’s worth looking up Admiral Le Fanu on wiki

An even better collection of photos overnight. Back in 1971 I got to visit Eagle when she came to Wellington, New Zealand on a non public day with the Aviation Historical Society of New Zealand so we got to see a few other places.

While checking out the aircraft list, I found that on the public days which I think there was two, 26,000 kiwis visited the ship.

Just a few more from the collection.

13.
HMS Eagle-5 by Timc63, on Flickr

14. Gannet AEW3
HMS Eagle by Timc63, on Flickr

15.
HMS Eagle-2 by Timc63, on Flickr

16.
HMS Eagle-3 by Timc63, on Flickr

17.
HMS Eagle-4 by Timc63, on Flickr

18…And for some reason my favorite shot!
HMS Eagle-6 by Timc63, on Flickr

HMS Eagle was quite capable later of operating Phantoms as well as Ark Royal after re-fit, but was withdrawn prematurely by an anti carrier Labour government at the time.

Regards, Gerry R

Not quite. While Eagle had been used for trials of the Phantom FG.1, that was with steel plates welded to the deck behind the catapults to protect the flight deck from the downward-pointing afterburner exhausts, and only one DAX-II arresting engine (#3) installed (the 4 others remained DAX-Is). Her catapults were the same as what Ark Royal got in 1970 (except for the bridle-catcher “horn”s).

She would have needed the other arresting engines replaced, catapult “horns” and water-cooled JBDs (jet-blast deflectors) installed, as well as getting avionics, engine, etc maintenance equipment for the Phantom installed.

Yes, this would have cost comparatively little – the estimate in 1967 was £5 million and 6 months.

– Eagle modernization 1960-1963: £500MM (included full rework of boilers, turbines, and so much more)

– Ark Royal Phantomization 1967-1969: £400MM (ignored boilers, turbines, and much of the auxiliary equipment)

Thanks for posting these, what vivid and beautiful images. I particularly love the Vixen at low level “showing off”. Just look at those condensation vortices!

HMS Eagle 1967 Commission, The FAA at its Zenith.

Many thanks to Tim,and Barry for making available the late Grenville (Budgie R.I.P) images with this thread.

Just got to say what a superb collection they are, the Fleet Air Arm and carrier aviation at its Zenith. HMS Eagle was quite capable later of operating Phantoms as well as Ark Royal after re-fit, but was withdrawn prematurely by an anti carrier Labour government at the time.

If you have more in the collection, please do not hesitate to post again.

Regards, Gerry R

Excellent photos of Eagle’s 1967 commission. I particularly enjoyed picture 11 showing the Buccaneer overflying the surprisingly sparsely occupied pans of RAF Khormaksar in Aden. I would have been underneath it at the time, not far from the Beverley in the bottom right corner. Usually, the aircraft pans would be quite full as our resident squadrons included Hunter, Shackleton, Wessex, Twin Pioneer, Beverley and Argosy aircraft as well as the RAF’s last operational Dakota. Also daily visitors to Khormaksar included Britannia and VC10 troopers from British Eagle, British United Airways and RAF Transport Command, plus many regular scheduled civil flights including DC3’s and VC10’s from Aden and East African Airways respectively. RAF Vulcan, Victor and Canberra’s were also frequent visitors as were a variety of United States and French military types.

I also remember the old aircraft dump seen at the bottom centre of the picture where I recall clambering over a derelict Egyptian Air Force Ilyushin transport and an even older abandoned B25 Mitchell bomber. Going back to the Beverley at bottom right, I was especially pleased to see the lines of ‘blast walls’ built to protect the aircraft from mortar attack that I and many other ‘volunteers’ built in the summer of ’67. They were constructed of thousands of 45 gallon oil drums stacked three high and filled with water – gruelling work in temperatures exceeding 100 degrees.

Anyway, many thanks for showing the photos and evoking old memories. Regards….Paul

Super pics. What carrier is that in pic 10 please ?

It would be HMS Albion or Bulwark after conversion to a helicopter carrier.

Great pictures! I have a copy of the rocket firing Sea Vixen that I think was from a set I purchased at the FAA museum 20 odd years ago.

Bill