The static displays at RAF Cosford’s air show included quite the variety of out of service types that are kept at Cosford for training purposes. This included the first generation of Harriers. A pair of Harrier GR3s were on one lineup while a Sea Harrier FA2 was on another. The sun was out on the GR3s which made their ‘80s camouflage look great. Funny how, after years of Harrier IIs in service, when I think of Harriers, it is still the GR3s and the SHARs that come to mind.
Parked in the static at RAF Cosford’s air show was a Chinook. Nothing too special, you might be forgiven for thinking. However, this is a Chinook with some history. Known broadly as Bravo November, despite having worn many markings over the years, this aircraft was delivered to the RAF in 1980. In 1982, it was one of four that went south to the Falklands on Atlantic Conveyor. It was the first to have its blades fitted and flew off the ship shortly before it was hit by an Exocet. The other three Chinooks went down with the ship.
As the sole Chinook with the task force, her lifting capacity was in high demand. There were missions when she was seriously overloaded compared to what the release to service might have said. Some rapid leaps forward were possible by carrying way more troops than would have been the case in peacetime. There was also one flight when the crew got too low and hit a lake. As they skimmed across the surface, water sprayed up towards the engines which began to spool down. A chunk of collective pulled them up and, without the water hitting them, the engines were able to come back up to power. Amazingly no serious damage was done, and she served throughout the remainder of the conflict.
The Falkland’s conflict was 1982 and there were then decades of service in all sorts of operations – both peacetime and conflict. Finally, the airframe has come to the end of its life and now it is on the ground at Cosford. Plenty of visitors were checking out this historic helicopter. Towards the end of the day, the sun came around nicely and it looked great.
The Rafale has been in service for a long time now and exports have meant more countries operate it. I got to see some Indian Air Force examples when they came through Washington a couple of years ago. However, my experience of watching a display has been limited to the original Rafale A demonstrator and then the initial Rafale C development aircraft – both of which displayed at Farnborough. I have not seen a Rafale display since then.
This wasn’t the only reason I went to Cosford but it certainly was a big factor. The cancellation of RIAT had me thinking about what other air shows I might want to see and, while Cosford is not ideal from a lighting point of view with the crowd facing south-east, the knowledge that the French Air Force was bringing a Rafale to display was influential in my decision to go.
The display was excellent. I don’t know whether it is the characteristics of the aircraft and the nature of the display flying that the French Air Force goes for but this was an excellent show. (The French Mirage 2000 display always used to wow me too so there is a pattern.) The plane was constantly in motion and it really kept the attention of the crowd. There are definitely some lessons that other air forces could learn.
The display was just far enough into the show to get some benefit from the lighting coming around slightly. There was also some cloud which may have reduced the potential for silhouetting of the jet against the sky. I was a bit out of practice with my tracking but managed to get a few shots that I was happy with. I am not always in favour of special paint schemes for display jets but this one was no bad thing. I do hope to see the display again at some point – preferably in better lighting.
More from the film scanning archive. I made a trip to the museum at RAF Cosford when I was visiting my friends Jon and Charlie in the area. Now Jon works there but at the time it was just an extra to my visit. At the time, British Airways had a collection of aircraft at the museum. This included lots of their older types in storage. Sadly, the cost of keeping the collection was not something BA management deemed worthwhile and they stopped funding it. The museum couldn’t afford to keep them up so they were scrapped on site. I wish I had a better record of them but this is all I have. Fortunately, others will have done better recording them.
