HMS Coventry 1982

[Edmund Spencer]

How close was Neil Thomas to the inbound raid to HMS Coventry when he was hauled off due "Birds Affirm" on 25th May 1982.
Had he called visual contact? And, if so, what was the range?
Naval Eye can you help?

[AndySmith]

According to Sharkey's book, they were "almost at sidewinder release range at the attackers' 6 o'clock". I guess you would know what that distance is?

That is the only reference I can find at the moment.

Cheers

Andy

[Fox3WheresMyBanana]

Probably around 2 miles then.
Depending on closure rate (or lack of), he might still have been "almost in range" 20 minutes later.
The devil's in the details.

[clicker]

From my copy of Falklands The Air War it says Neill Thomas (in XZ496) and Dave Smith (in XZ459) were vectored towards in incoming flight which consisted of four A-4B Skyhawks from Grupo 5. The Skyhawk flight split into two separate attack elements......Two were seen by Neill Thomas, who dived at the hostiles and got within three miles of them before being ordered to break off the interception. The book states these Skyhawks were heading for HMS Broadsword.

It then goes on to say the Sea Harrier CAP headed for the other pair, going for HMS Coventry but they were again ordered to break off. Broadsword had locked onto the targets but then Coventry broke the radar lock by coming between Broadsword and the Skyhawks. It does not give a distance between the Harriers and the Skyhawks for that engagement.

[500N]

Why were both aircraft told to break off the engagement ?

[Navaleye]

ES. From anecdotal evidence only I believe Captain Hart Dyke was mistaken in his belief that Sea Dart could have taken kill in such a space. I am detached from my reference material but I believe Hermes flight was visual with the incoming pair before being hauled off. You would know better than I and there are no official documents available given the heat of the moment. Coventry's track charts went with her. 3 miles is my best guess.

I contributed to the making of this account and believe it to be the most accurate and recent.

Please let me know what you think.

Kindest regards.

Seconds from Disaster: Sinking the Coventry (S06E08) - Video Dailymotion (http://www.dailymotion.com/video/xyixcl_seconds-from-disaster-sinking-the-coventry-s06e08_tech)

[Burnie5204]

500N said:
Why were both aircraft told to break off the engagement ?

If the ship-board defences were to be deployed against the incoming aircraft then you would not want your own aircraft behind them in-case of misses/strays/accidental targetting.

[AndySmith]

A very valid point. The aircraft being involved in the attacks on Coventry and Broadsword were A4s, and had been transiting at low level, and I believe that the SHARs were descending from the CAP to engage, so one could probably assume that they were catching them.

They did not reach the first pair before they entered the Sea Dart Zone, and were called off the second pair by Coventry, which from reading between the lines they were a lot closer to than the first.

This is a well know photo of the first pair, Carballo and Rinke, bearing in on Broadsword, taken by a very brave (or foolhardy) matelot.

http://i79.photobucket.com/albums/j137/cazabombardero/A-4FAAatacanbuqueingles.jpg

A

[clicker]

Just had a read of the BoI.

It gives the timings of the two flights of Seahawks as not more than 90 secs apart.

Ref the Sea Harrier attack on the second pair it says the Harriers were 4-5 miles from their intercept point when they were told to break off when "Birds Affirm" was called.

Pardon my ignorance, being a civvie and all that. Would I be right in assuming "Birds Affirm" be a call to say that the Sea Dart was going to make the intercept as they had a radar lock?

[AR1]

Respect to both ends of that photo. You need a pair to fly through that erupting sea. No matter how ineffective the fire was.

[Fox3WheresMyBanana]

You need even more courage to fly higher so that your bombs fuse.

[racedo]

Respect to both ends of that photo. You need a pair to fly through that erupting sea. No matter how ineffective the fire was.

Agree completely.

Not sure would have a steady hand seeing that coming at me.

[D John]

I wonder if Carballo and Rinke thought about useing their 20mm guns on the run in?

[racedo]

I wonder if Carballo and Rinke thought about useing their 20mm guns on the run in?

Possibly but bet now they glad they didn't.

Better to have a beer with an enemy you could have killed, than drinking alone to forget and regret what you have done, after visiting their grave.

[Tourist]

Racedo


That's a silly comment.


Better to win a war than lose it!

[500N]

Did these two pilots end up surviving the war ?

[Marcantilan]

Both Carballo and Rinke survived the war.

Five or six years ago, I attended a Carballo`s conference (then already retired from the Air Force) and he commented that he tried to sink ships, but not to kill people, and he regretted every loss of life.

[racedo]

That's a silly comment.


Better to win a war than lose it!

Nobody said anything about winning or losing a war.

What I said was about the people who for the rest of their lives may have to live with seeing faces they needlessly killed, when they were always going to achieve their objective.

Would you have rather the Argentinian pilots used guns and killed everybody ?
I am thankful they did not and as quoted they are as well.

[Navaleye]

ES, Apologies for the delay. I can find no record of a Judy from Thomas or you. In the absence of this Coventry rightly remained in control of the engagement. I hope this answers your question.

[Courtney Mil]

Quote: I wonder if Carballo and Rinke thought about useing their 20mm guns on the run in?
AND
Possibly but bet now they glad they didn't.

I'm sorry, but what fatuous statements. If any of us ever go to war with attitude we are not fit to serve. It is not our place to give quarter in the shooting part of any war. It was his job to destroy the ship, without consideration of the enemy, in this case us. It was his duty to employ any means at his disposal to do harm to the enemy. Not to think about trying not to kill the people that were trying to kill him and that he was under orders to kill. His job was to sink the ship and that, potentially, included killing everyone on board.

That's how it is.

[AndySmith]

The A4 cannon was very prone to jamming, that is why most go the cannon strafes during the conflict were the ones done by Daggers. Mind you, one of the A4 pilots emptied his entire 200 rounds of cannon shells into Vince :)

[beardy]

A series of understandable comments following Racedo's.

I agree with him, to an extent. Go back and read them again. He was not advocating any lack of aggression at the time. He was commenting on a possible current perspective that would have been shaped by events of the time and the intervening years. That's not too sophisticated a concept.

Luckily both parties to this series of battles were and still are relatively civilised and we can now drink together.

[racedo]

I'm sorry, but what fatuous statements. If any of us ever go to war with attitude we are not fit to serve. It is not our place to give quarter in the shooting part of any war. It was his job to destroy the ship, without consideration of the enemy, in this case us. It was his duty to employ any means at his disposal to do harm to the enemy. Not to think about trying not to kill the people that were trying to kill him and that he was under orders to kill. His job was to sink the ship and that, potentially, included killing everyone on board.

That's how it is.

All correct but when war finished, he was asked and gives a response, then listen to the response.

He did as he was expected to do for his country, no different from what is expected of anybody in uniform.

Fact is that years later he happy that he hadn't used the cannon to kill lots more is not a sign of regret that he didn't do his job, its a sign that he glad he didn't kill more people.

[Courtney Mil]

Ah, yes. I take your point. Sorry.

[Edmund Spencer]

I regret my memories of the event are rather hazy. I can, however, say with absolute certainty that I was never in visual contact with either element of the A4's. I was flying in 'fighting wing' on Neill's echelon at about 200 metres in a very similar intercept to the day before when I was with Andy Auld and we encountered and shot down 'Oro' section of three Mirage V's.
Correct me if I am wrong but I seem to remember the "Judy" was the pilot's affirmation that he had radar contact and was able to take over the intercept. In truth, most of the intercepts during the conflict were at ultra low level at very high speed and I really don't think we spent too much time looking at the radar.
For me the tragedy is that we easily had the performance to out accelerate and catch the A4's at low level. This was demonstrated convincingly when Dave Morgan and I bounced four A4's on the evening of 8 June.
If Neill had indeed been in visual contact we would without doubt have been able to close the distance and splash them.
ES

[trap one]

Judy is/was have radar contact and am taking the intercept.
Tally is/was Have visual.

[Dysonsphere]

This is a well know photo of the first pair, Carballo and Rinke, bearing in on Broadsword, taken by a very brave (or foolhardy) matelot.

Apart from aircraft looks just like a WW2 pic makes you wonder.

[AndySmith]

Apart from aircraft looks just like a WW2 pic makes you wonder.

Given that at this particular moment the sea wolf system had gone offline, and they were inside effective sea dart range, it was pretty much WW2 stuff, just not quite as much of it as a typical WW2 destroyer would have.

On the second pair, of course it was Coventry herself that broke the lock of the sea wolf. A bit like an aircraft accident - rarely is it just down to one single fault but a chain of errors or mistakes that when put together create a disaster. The A4s probably could have been intercepted before reaching the ships, but they were called off. Then, the sea dart wouldn't lock onto the inbounds. Finally, when Broadswords Sea Wolf had locks on them, Coventry steered across the beam and broke the lock and left the pair to make a successful attack and put 3 of their four bombs in to her, which for once, despite the height of release, for once exploded (unlike the ones dropped onto Broadsword). Very unfortunate for Coventry and very fortunate for the two A4 pilots.

[Lima Juliet]

They're making a film called "Destroyer" based upon COVENTRY and her loss. The skipper, Captain David Hart Dyke, will be played by Paul Bettany with the story based around Hart Dyke's own account.

On Captain Hart Dyke, take a look at the picture below and in particular the child in the middle:

http://i.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2011/01/24/article-1350076-003E6854000004B0-670_468x756.jpg

The child in the centre is Miranda Hart, the comedian/actress who is the daughter of Hart Dyke. Now there's a good one for a Pub Quiz!

LJ

[Lima Juliet]

Just to correct one point - "Judy" can be called for either RADAR or visual contact and means that the aircrew now accept responsibility for taking control of the intercept (I was briefed to use Judy on Hawks and JPs with no RADAR fitted or when my fighter jet's RADAR was U/S and we were Alpha Control).

[Courtney Mil]

Actually, "Tally" means visual contact with enemy a/c, "Visual" means visual contact with friendly.

[orca]

And 'Blind, No Joy' means - 'Damn it, not again!'

[Wander00]

Didn't wartime nightfighter navs use the expression "my weapon is bent" if the radar did not work

[FODPlod]

More modern than that, NATO uses "My gadget is bent."

[Navaleye]

ES,

Your CAP station was east of Coventry covering the northern entrance to Falkland Sound which was a popular egress route for the Args. I doubt either you or Neil would have visual with either incoming flight. Best I can do.

[ExAscoteer]

More modern than that, NATO uses "My gadget is bent."

Nope.

It was a Wartime Codeword for the earliest of AI Radars.

[AtomKraft]

That's a heck of a photo. :ok:

[Jail Ale]

Just found this thread and thought the following might be of interest, from Jets magazine, Summer 2000 edition:


Neill Thomas had just taken off on CAP with Lt Dave Smith. The British had received intelligence from the mainland that Skyhawks had taken off from Rio Gallegos. "Generally these reports were quite reliable. They couldn't be specific about when the attack would arrive, but we knew something was on," says Thomas. "So when we were told, by Hermes, to go and have a look for a Pucara north of Port Stanley, I queried it - and afterwards stormed down to the ops room, pretty angry. But it was their call.
"We had a look, perhaps not as low as we should have done because I didn't think the Pucara was all that important at that stage, and then had to climb up and go off north-west towards our CAP position to the north of Falkland Sound.
"As we started to let down we got a call - it was Broadsword - that they'd picked up an aircraft coming out from the coast." The 'missile trap' picket had been working well: just that morning it had accounted for two 4 Grupo Skyhawks with Sea Dart, while the day before Andy Auld and Dave Smith of 800NAS had been vectored by Coventry onto a flight of Daggers and shot down three of them. Now the ships were about to come under attack by two flights of two A-4Bs of 5 Grupo, which had been sent out to find them. Thomas and Smith were still ten miles from their CAP area, heading north-west. The first two Skyhawks were already over the sea at low level, heading north at high speed on their bombing run.
"It was touch and go whether we'd get there in time; we just opened the taps and went for it," Thomas remembers. "But I still hadn't seen the A-4s when we were called off by Coventry because we were approaching their missile engagement zone."
But on board the Type 42 the Sea Dart's 909 radar was confused by echoes from the distant shore of Pebble Island and couldn't lock on to the Skyhawks. Broadsword's Sea Wolf saw two aircraft, but flying very close together, and that didn't look like a recognisable target. Coventry opened up with her 4.5-inch gun. While Neill and Smith in their Sea Harriers executed a wide 360 to keep clear of Coventry's Sea Darts, two 1000-lb bombs skipped over Broadsword, a third fell short, and the fourth ploughed through the flight deck without exploding and demolished the nose of the Lynx.
By the standards of that day, Broadsword was lucky. The next pair of Skyhawks was already committed to its run over the sea. Again Smith and Thomas were desperately searching for their small, fast, low-level targets when David Hart Dyke, Coventry's captain, again called on them to clear the MEZ. Sea Wolf was back on line, although Sea Dart still couldn't make out its targets. Then as Broadsword prepared to despatch the A-4s her guidance system was suddenly masked by Coventry crossing in front of the frigate: the missiles were blindfolded. "By the time we came in the second time, we were in exactly the same position," said Thomas. With the Sea Harriers in no position to stop him Primer Teniente Mariano Velasco put three bombs into the destroyer's starboard side. "As we started to turn I saw the bombs go off. It was dreadful." Nineteen men were killed, and within minutes the ship had turned over. Overhead Thomas and Smith could only watch.
"Inevitably, you start thinking about whether you did the right thing," says Thomas. "For years afterwards David Hart Dyke, whenever I saw him, would ask: 'Did I call you off too soon?' It was obviously very much on his mind. But tactically he was exactly right, unless he knew we were right in behind the aeroplane - and at that stage I hadn't seen it.
"If we had been there a few minutes earlier, it might have been different. It only took five minutes to look for that Pucara, but that might have been enough."

[Navaleye]

Both pairs came up A4 Alley over West Falkland. Having conferred with several folks present at the time, I believe the reports on this thread to be correct.

The correct procedure would have been engage with any weapons to hand and you don't want friendly aircraft in the area when their are Sea Dart in the air.

the limitations of Sea Dart were well known by both sides. The Ops Room team knew it was down to them.