PPRuNe Forums - View Single Post - V Bomber dispersal airfields after 1968
View Single Post
Old 17th Feb 2012, 11:19
  #57 (permalink)  
tornadoken
 
Join Date: Nov 2005
Location: london
Posts: 379
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes on 0 Posts
S41: indeed he does. He also has no co-housing of US and UK bombs, same SSA, and has US gone from BC SSAs 17/3/62. So: YS2 into Wadd/Honington some weeks later. Finningley SSA served Scampton so 27 and 83 Sqdns. could have stood Q from 1/1/62, soon 617 Sqdn, with their interim YS2. Wadd. Vulcan 1 44/50/101 Sqdns. from c.1/4/62, Honington Victor 1 55/57 Sqdn from c.1/5/62.

Plans on paper are Archive sources; facts on ground may have differed. Wynn P.303 has 14/12/59 Plan for 30 dispersals, cockpit readiness at end of runway: i.e: cheap. That could explain posters' suggestions/log book visits to, say, Tarrant Rushton, Thorney I., Chivenor, Shawbury, Kemble, W.Freugh. P.301 has 22/10/59 wish for turning loops at Leeming and Pershore. P.302, 22/10/59 has ORPs as "by far the best method". Then P.306, 2/62 has "a building programme now in hand for ORPs (&tc) at (9 Main Bases and) 27 dispersals"...but that was before 12/62 demise of Skybolt, which was to have equipped at least 48 Vulcan 2, Coningsby/Scampton. I suggest that of these 27, the commitment to Polaris instantly scuppered (Stansted and) Bruntingthorpe, Burtonwood, Cranwell, Elvington, Llanbedr, Middleton St.George, Prestwick: these 7, P.552: "given up in 1966".

PN: Wynn's P.338 BOl.301 point is "a rapid start capability...(by31/12/63) 32 a/c were fitted". MF >1969: P.554 has Defence Minister Healey, 3/7/69: "it is no longer necessary to keep a/c of the V-bomber force at immediate readiness".
tornadoken is offline