C130 supply missions
I was working for a defence company during Operation Corporate and we had some extremely urgent requests for equipment. The orders were fulfilled by working huge levels of overtime and the equipment was despatched ASAP, but by this time the task force had sailed from Ascension.
The story I heard (some time after the events) was that the equipment was loaded onto a C130 and para-dropped into the South Atlantic adjacent to the Task Force. Unfortunately the floatation devices on the shipment didn't work as intended and the equipment sank to the bottom of the ocean before it could be picked up by the Task Force.
Is there any truth to this story? If so, was it a one-off mission or were there a number of these?
Was the C130 refuelled en-route to the Task Force by the Victors? If so, did these refuelling missions have any of the complexity of the Black Buck missions?
Did the American's assist with / perform this supply mission? Para-dropping cargo into the sea in floating containers/pallets doesn't sound like a routine mission for RAF C130s, but I could be wrong...