Yes - the Andover was a much-loved aircraft in the RNZAF and the STOL characteristics were widely used around the Pacific - landing on beaches and rough strips. It also proved to be a good way to gather your mates up for 21st, engagement and wedding parties, on 'weekend crew trainers'. One was laso barrel-rolled, resulting in a GCM.
BAC/BAe did propose a Maritime version of the veritable Andover; indeed the Kiwi ones did have a secondary SAR role, increadulously using the E-190 as a search radar. I recall bobbing around in the Waitemata Harbour , waiting for the 3-cannister Lindholme gear to be dropped up-wind. It was dropped about 200 yards down wind...
But the military BAe 146 could not be taken seriously; it could not self-deploy (because of the need for an external side ramp) and it is utterly unbeleivable that such projects were allowed to run (presumably with tax-payers money) in the 1980s. But there was also the Nimrod AEW project running...nobody's mentioned that yet?