Question for the Queens Flight / Royal Flight Experts

[Warmtoast]

I was stationed at Biggin Hill from late 1953 to early 1956. Whilst there the Queen Mother as Honorary Air Commodore to 600 [City of London] Squadron RAuxAF, made a visit to the squadron. She arrived and departed in a Royal Navy Westland Whirlwind helicopter.

My photo of the event taken I think in the winter of 1954/55 can be seen here:
http://groups.msn.com/TonyHawesRAFService195163/rafbigginhill19531955.msnw?action=ShowPhoto&PhotoID=720

So my query is why did the Queen Mum use a RN helicopter rather than an RAF one of the Queen's flight for her visit?

Original photo is not clear enough to fully resolve the serial number of the Whilwind apart from the prefix which looks like WV and the final number which may be 4.

[JagRigger]

Long shot answer..........

The Navy had Whirlwinds a year or two before the RAF ( 53 as opposed to 55 )

Was it a case of this was the newest, safest type around in late 54?

[Blacksheep]

The Queen's Flight later equipped with two Westland Whirlwind HCC12s of their own. One of them had a main rotor shaft failure. The rotor head separated and the helicopter crashed with the loss of the crew. The rotor shaft was found to have been subjected to a local hot spot by improper machining during manufacture.

For safety reasons, HM Queens's Flight thenceforth only operated twin engined helicopters. The remaining HCC12 - XR486 - was then transferred to 32 Squadron, the VIP transport unit operating out of Northolt, where I worked on it for a time along with their HCC10s and Andover CC2s.

The Wessex still had only one main rotor drive shaft though... :rolleyes:

[RRAAMJET]

I'll check from my official history, but offhand I'm pretty sure Jagrigger has it right. I'm flying a trip right now - I'll get back on this...
Cheers ex-TQF

[Amos Keeto]

The Queens Flight didn't get their own helicopter until 1954, when they had a Westland Dragonfly on loan from CFS for a year , then borrowed a RAF Whirlwind HC.2(XJ432) in 1956-67, followed by a Royal Navy Whirlwind HAR.4( XL111) in 1958-59,until finally they got their own first two piston-engined Whirlwind HCC.8s, XN126/7 in late 1959. As already related, these were replaced by two Gnome-engined Whirlwind HCC.12s, XR486/7 in 1964.