The NA Apache wasn’t used by the British, so the naming of that dosen’t count.

Actually, it was, but not by that name!!

And Mustang was the name applied by the RAF.

It just fitted the RAF policy of using place names in the US for larger aircraft – Boston and Baltimore may have been cities, but Maryland is a state.

The alliteration helped!!

It’s still in the appropriate British Standard (BS381C) as colour 636 PRU Blue

An interesting aspect of the colour is that the’6**’ range is now used for greys.

Found the bit I saw, a bit less than 95K is claimed!!

http://www.lightning.org.uk/archive/0410.php

Lightning would be my guess as well.

As for the MoD buying Islanders recently, it seems to be a fad at the moment, witness the recent aquisition of Squirels, Griffons, Agusta 109s many years after other civilain and military operators.

The Islanders were introduced to replace the Beavers in NI – they’ve actually been in service for 20 years now!! Similarly with the Bell 212s the Army uses.

The more recent Defenders have been for a specific need in Iraq.

As for Squirrels, Griffons etc, the advantages of leasing basically civillian aircraft has resulted in that.

Simple answer – because it wasn’t a military aircraft. It didn’t have the things the military needed in an airlifter – no rear ramp being the main one. In terms of military use of airliners, it’s too small for the long-range use, and the RAF hasn’t used small airliners very much at all. What role would you give it?

The ‘Side Tactical Loader’ was a good attempt by BAE to try and make military sales form the freighter 146, but the need for a lot of ground support for the side loader would take away all the advantages of a small STOL tactical airlifter. Compare with the Hercules or G22/C27. Nobody bought it (albeit Austria almost did – to the point where it was painted in Austrian AF colours) because it had no military effectiveness.

Duncan Curtiss’ book on RAF Sabres has a list of all the pilots involved, and details of many of their service