Goodness me, Naval, it is a rather long story but, at the risk of being 'moderated', here goes.
8 June 1982
Dave Morgan and I were launching from HMS Hermes on the first of our 'duskers' sorties to carry out a CAP south west of Stanley in the immediate overhead of HMS Galahad. I can't remember the actual figures but I think the transit was about 200 miles and the CAP was initially at 10,000 feet. Galahad had been hit by bombs earlier and I remember a thick cloud of black smoke pouring out of her and the aft end literally glowing red with the intensity of the fires below decks. We were right at the end of our time on task and about to depart back to Hermes when Dave spots four aircraft below. His actual words were something like "F..k me Dave! Four mirages! Follow me down!" (Subsequently turned out to be A4's.) We were 180 degrees out in a turn at the time and he promptly disappeared from sight into the gathering gloom. I rolled and pulled and went for the deck at full power calling Dave for the attack heading. He came back with something like "240" and I pulled out at about 150 feet doing just over 600 knots heading south west. I still couldn't see anything but a few seconds later Dave opened up in quick succession with both his sidewinders. I saw these missiles hit the back two A4's and thereby got visual with Dave. One of the A4 pilots had ejected and I very nearly picked him up on my wing in his parachute! Dave was then closing the third A4 and opened up with his cannons. From the bullet splashes on the water I finally got a 'tally' on the target and as Dave pulled off and out of the picture I got a good IR lock from one of my AIM 9L's. I reckoned I was at about 50 feet at this stage still doing about 615 knots and I still couldn't put the A4 on the horizon so he must have been quite low. The range looked a bit excessive and I remember hesitating for a second or two trying to assess whether it was worth taking the shot. At that very moment Sharkey Ward comes on the radio and says "OK, we are coming in from the south and taking over!" or words to that effect. This caused me to completely loose the bubble! Although I had seen Dave shoot at this target I hadn't positively identified it and I had an instant of pure panic as I questioned if it was actually Sharkey or Steve Thomas I had in my sights. Well, I fired anyway and this prompted "Who fired that shot?" from Sharkey and for a ghastly moment I thought I had shot at Steve. Then Steve came back with "It wasn't me, Boss" and I heaved a sigh of relief. The missile tracked the A4 and then seemed to flame out. I was fairly certain it wouldn't hit but then at the very end of its trajectory it detonated and destroyed the target.
As an interesting aside this action left us both very short of fuel and a recovery to the ship which was quite a bit later than the planned duskers! I don't even want to contemplate what I shut down with but I remember the flashing bingo lights from a very long way out from landing!
ES
Last edited by Edmund Spencer; 4th Jan 2009 at 05:08.