"Bombs gone"

[Data-Lynx]

Buttons!!

Sqn Folklore suggests that a BOI in the early 70s recorded a Wessex pilot's statement at weapon release as:

I saw the firing button was uncovered so I pressed it anyway.

This Wessex Mk5 from 84? Sqn was in the pattern for a Cyprus range with a pair of 14x 2inch rocket projectile (RP) pods. The BOI had been formed to investigate the 2x RPs (solid heads) which had been negligently discharged from the Wessex into/near to someone's garden, while the aircraft was downwind. No one was hurt. It transpired that the Master Armament Safety Switch and the RP pod switches has not been de-selected and that the red cover had not been slid back over the firing button on the top of the cyclic, on climbout from the previous 'in hot'.

Thankfully, the BOI did not get to record the HWI's little secret that, only 45 minutes before the incident, all aircraft has been re-armed with inert heads. The first sorties had fired HE RP but that range was not cleared for HE.