VL,
To add a bit of relevance, and since the
Taurus Mountain 2 exercise was mentioned earlier, extracts from a recent
Av Week article:
Olympics Trial
Aviation Week & Space Technology 03/19/2012
...Further additions to the normal QRA force structure will come from rotary-wing platforms. Royal Air Force Puma helicopters, as well as Lynx platforms operated by both the Navy and Army, are being added to mirror the practice—honed in Afghanistan—of gradual escalation of effect. If attempts to communicate visually with pilots of unresponsive aircraft fail, RAF Regiment sniper teams on board can use weapons such as warning flares, shotguns and rifles.
“Sniping from a helicopter isn’t new,” says Wing Cdr. Shane Anderson, commanding officer of the Puma-equipped 33 Sqdn., “but sniping from a helicopter at another aircraft is new for us. The French have had the capability for quite a long time, so we’ve had a look at that.”
“We’ve been working closely with the Typhoon, Sentry and Puma aircrews, just to ensure that we know exactly what each part of the layered defense is doing,” explains one sergeant in the RAF Regiment’s Sniper Training Team. “Every exercise takes it up a level, with more moving parts, so the guy who has sat behind the weapon system has the utmost confidence that at the moment he pulls that trigger he knows he’s doing the right thing.”
I/C