RAF Kinloss - 21/11/2007

Our third day in Scotland proved to be a real damp squib.

We were in at 0730 and sat in on the White Force briefing, where the plans and prospects for the day ahead were laid out. It immediately became clear that there were going to be issues. The weather (a vicious crosswind teamed up with heavy rainfall) meant that the E-3D Sentry was unable to take part in the day's activities immediately (the radome significantly reduces the crosswind limits for the type).

There were real concerns that the whole mission would scrub as the situation was forecast to deteriorate further during the day, but aside from the Met Brief, the 'players' were still told that the mission would be going ahead - the theory being that they would at least get the benefit from the planning even if they didn't actually get to fly it through.

Despite this, 20(R) and XI(F) Sqns still took the opportunity to get some flying in during the morning, and we were taken out to the runway caravan by a very accomodating Bird Controller.

After the second mass briefing most of the elements for the CQWI mission were canned. At that stage the Harriers, Typhoons and Tornado F3s were still hoping to fly, but the crosswind prohibited the Harriers from doing so, and they even looked at the possibility of recovering to Lossiemouth instead.

So, in the end just the Typhoons (a four-ship) and the F3s (again, a four-ship) got away. We missed the F3s' departure, but a very helpful ATC assistant took us out in the van to one of the runway intersections for the Typhoons. As you can see, the weather really was foul! I should add that this was approximately 1430 and it was nearly dark!!

After the players returned we got chatting to some of the XV(R) Sqn crews and we discovered that they too had managed to get airborne (they were operating from Lossie) and they'd actually managed to get their 'lives' away! It turned out that they were the same crews who'd dropped the lives and performed the awesome 'shows of force' for us at Cape Wrath the day before and it became very much a case of you show us yours and we'll show you ours, so we actually got to see the in-cockpit video from the runs when we were present! Very interesting to see things from the other side.

All in all a very disappointing day, however, the following day was even worse with nothing getting airborne at all.

My sincere thanks go to everyone who made our presence and access possible during our four days away, not least Wg Cdr Sullivan, Major Mal Robb, Flt Lt Adam Dickson, Sgt Andrew Walker and Dawn the Kinloss PAO.