Harrier/Jaguar operations from autobahns
 

Hope someone can help me out.

For a project my son is working on at Air Cadets I would like details and/or photos of Harriers and/or Jaguars operating from autobahns during the 1970's.

I've tried searching on here and Google but without luck.

Any help much appreciated.

And photo here:

http://www.iht.org/motorway/jaguar.jpg

and

http://www.military.cz/international...es/harvl_3.jpg

Is the curvature of the earth particularly marked at the M55 then?

No, but it is very close to the end of the World :}

If your son's project is not limited to RAF aircraft, the Swedish and Swiss air forces operate from roads too.

RAF Gutersloh frequently deployed to the German Sennelager range and one of the 6 sites used a straight section of white concrete 'tank road' in the forest (only 'cos it was there - unlike Jaguar, a car-park would have done:).)

I've sent you a PM to link to some pics.

Nigel Walpole's history of RAF Bruggen - "Seek and Strike" - has a picture on page 79 of Fg Off Gary Rogers of 31 Sqn landing a Jaguar GR1 on an autobahn; the first to do so. It is not of very good quality but I am prepared to scan it in for you. If you would like me to, please send PM

Boxer42,

My Old Man was in the MOD at the time the Jag came into service and had a fair bit to do with the M55 flight - they delayed opening the motorway IIRC to do it. If you want some more info on that side of it - we've got some pics at home somewhere - then PM me and I'll ask Dad to look them out, scan them and e-mail them to me.

Regards

I was in ATC at Gutersloh (first time) 83-86 and only once deployed off an Autobahn. Cannot recall the number/name but it ran past Paderborn and the opening was slightly delayed to allow a Harrier Deployment.

http://i80.photobucket.com/albums/j1...arrierMWay.jpg
This was an official photographers picture.

http://i80.photobucket.com/albums/j1...arrierSite.jpg
This was one of the Harrier pictures (sorry about the aged sticky tape) of the Rastplatz which is where the site domestic area was set up.

http://i80.photobucket.com/albums/j1...rrierSite1.jpg
Just another site near a canal, we used this picture as the crash grid map. Got several others.

BD

Bdi - I was at Gut about the same time. I recollect that there was a bit of a stink with the locals as they wanted to use the road asap and didn't take well to the bl**dy tommies flying off it. On the range ring road at Sennelager there were custom built hides just off the road site. At Bergen-Hohne a Cloggy Leopard and M103 had a race on the MEXE strip and dug it all up, helluva mess! The poor old RE's went ballistic. Late 80's at EDUO; best days of my life:ok:

Sat in a bus on said road having returned from shower run, stopped initially by the plods from proceeding, driver decides to ignore the advice and carry on. Bright light spotted ahead...Oh dear it's attached to a nose wheel...a few seconds later GR3 arrives about 50ft overhead. Jockey grinning from ear to ear.

Couldn't happen nowadays with the latest generation of average speed cameras popping up everywhere!

Eberhard, never enjoyed operating from there. ATC/Fire/Medic tents close to the road and there were a lot of trainee Leopard tank drivers passing by at all hours.

Boxer42 - the modus operandi for the Harrier Force (apart from 1 sqdn whose idea of a field deployment was to occupy the 3 & 4 Sqdn HAS sites at The Gut when they were out in the woods) was to operate from wooded areas close to the FEBA (Forward Edge of the Battle Area). In war they'd have used large buildings like supermarkets, industrial complexes etc. Harriers only needed a 1000 foot strip to take off from, motorways would be overkill.

BD

On top of which, the autobahn were also the Main Supply Routes for NATO, with thousands of vehicles heading East to the Inner German Border, hopefully getting into position before they met the 3rd Soviet Shock Army coming West!

I'm sure that I read about a Jaguar Squadron exercise from an autobahn. I'm pretty sure that it involved 20 Squadron.

True but if you recall all the curious signs on the roads, they were indicating main routes, refugee routes etc. The army produced maps showing the wartime convoy routes.
Did practice something along those lines during one of the major ReForGer exercises, Lionheart. 1000's of troops flown in from UK and USA, NATO forces came forward into some of the rear areas, trains back to blighty for the injured etc. etc. They had 100's of NATO MP's closing roads and operating junctions giving priority to military convoys. Goodness knows how much that exercise must have cost. But it was the height of the cold war.

BD

All these plans seem great, though perhaps leaning too far on the hope that noone on the enemies side thought about autobahn denial!!

Thanks for all the responses so far. Just to clarify, it is specifically RAF Harrier or Jaguar operations in Germany he is interested in.

My understanding was that the Harrier would have operated from more 'rural' sites with Jaguars 'possibly' using the roads. Some photo evidence of both or either using a road is what I'm after.

BOAC, thanks for the pm.

vmv2, pm sent.

BDiONU, thats great, thanks a lot

Cheers.

The pic I posted is the only time I knew of Harriers using an autobahn (was also there 90-92, when the wall came down), although you could count Eberhard as a road. I have other pics of them landing on concrete or mexe pads but never roads. Take off was generally from a 1000 foot mexe strip (laid by the RE) in the middle of a forested area.
Harriers deployed 4 times a year, 3 x 2 week periods and a single week in the winter. For the 2 week periods there were 6 flying sites, each of which could accomodate 7 or 8 aircraft but generally had 6. There were 3 logistics sites which resupplied the flying sites at night with materiel and provisions. There was one FWOC (Forward Wing Ops Centre).
The sites often exercised moving, at short or no notice (especially the FWOC), to other sites so mobility was a key. The whole operation worked very well and Gutersloh was always awarded a 1 (highest 1, lowest 4) during the annual TacEval (Tactical Evaluation) by other NATO units.

BD