Lt Col Francisco 'Pancho' Ramirez last saw his UH-1 Huey helicopter at Port Stanley in 1982. On Thursday he was flying in it again at North Weald....
Back in March we were contacted by former Royal Navy Sea King pilot Bill Fewtrell with an enquiry about who operated the UH-1 Huey helicopter, G-HUEY, which is based at the Airfield's Hangar 4a and had originally served with the Argentinian Army. We were able to put him in touch with the owner, Mark Fitzgerald.
Bill had flown Sea Kings in the South Atlantic with 846 Squadron in 1982, serving initially on HMS Hermes and the roll-on-roll-off ferry Norland, which carried 800 men of 2nd Battalion Parachute Regiment and men of 848 Naval Air Squadron to San Carlos on 21 May.
Bill also ‘flew shotgun’ with Royal Marine liaison officer Col Peter Reynolds on many missions. In 2004 Peter was the British Defence Attaché in Buenos Aires and had met ‘Pancho’ Ramirez there and they had become firm friends.
It turned out that Pancho had flown G-HUEY with the 601 Combat Aviation Battalion in Port Stanley. He later expressed an interest in seeing the helicopter again when he visited England. And this is why we received the original query.
The trip finally came to fruition on Thursday of this week when Pancho along with his wife and daughter (who had flown in from Texas) visited the Airfield. Peter, Bill and their families came along too. Mark Fitzgerald later took Pancho and his wife for a short flight in the helicopter.
We were delighted to welcome these veterans to North Weald for a reunion in happier circumstances and for Pancho to be able to fly in ‘his’ helicopter for one more time!
