The 28th was Goose Green Day. We had attacked the airfield with 4 GR3s on the 22nd, and had heavy AAA fired against us, but fortunately - or amazingly - all 4 got through without being hit. It was very distracting and just a little frightening. On (I think) the 27th, we had lost a GR3 to AAA at Goose Green. The pilot ejected and survived, but they had added that GR3 to the SHAR they had dropped earlier, killing the pilot. So we didn't like Goose Green.
I was sitting in the cockpit on deck waiting for a task for quite a long time. The only entertainment was HMS BROADSWORD, which was acting as our goalkeeper with its Sea Wolf missile system. Sailing very close abeam midship, it was a fine piece of seamanship to watch. The sea was quite rough, and we were taking water over the bow on HERMES. BROADSWORD was at times pretending to be a submarine as it plowed through some of the very large waves.
No task had come in, the weather was atrocious, and the light was going, so we were stood down and had just got into the space we were using as a briefing area when an Immediate task came in to support 2 Para who were close in to the settlement at Goose Green, but were being held back by AAA guns which were located to the East of the settlement and were being used in a direct fire mode against them. I had about 30 seconds to plot the target position and draw a quick line on the map which kept me clear of the high ground, and with an attack direction which avoided the settlement. Two of us went back onto the deck to our aircraft which were loaded with CBUs, and picked up a third GR3 armed with two pods of 2" rockets. We launched, did the usual high level transit to the Islands, and as we got close to Goose Green, the cloud was breaking up, so we could see the ground to let down. Also, having gone some 200 miles west from the carrier, the light was a little better, so down we went. The FAC gave us the same position for our target and cleared us through. The run in was over where 2 Para had been fighting, and it was exactly as you might imagine a battlefield to look - lots of smoke and a few fires. I ran in very low and dropped my CBUs where I had been told, and as I flew over, I spotted a gun just under my starboard wing. I called the aircraft behind me to drop/fire a little to the right of my fall of shot, which they just had time to do. We then went back to HERMES.
Chris Keeble who had taken over as CO after H Jones had been killed later said that we - his words - "wellied the target". At last we had finally done what we had been training to do for years - attack a valuable target and help the ground forces complete their battle.