HMS Queen Elizabeth to exercise with a full deck
 

2 Squadrons of F-35 ( One US Marines) and a full heli complement

https://ukdefencejournal.org.uk/hms-...-for-exercise/

There once was a time when, with all due respect, there would have been insufficient space for more than a couple of visiting, non-Brit, aircraft on any of our carriers !! Days long gone, I guess!!

Bill

USMC F-35s due at Marham this evening, apparently.

I think they arrived yesterday?

yes they did here are my photos of Wake Island Avengers first batch arriving in semi good light.

cheers


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Six cabs from 820 NAS embarked Thursday night, ship sails 15:30 Monday.

CU going to be mighty quiet for a bit....

https://www.portsmouth.co.uk/news/de...ailing-2974985

More crew on HMS Queen Elizabeth test positive for Covid-19 ahead of planned Friday sailing

Curious, do you know if 820 landed on the ship while it was pierside? Would have thought they would fly out while the ship was at sea.

They landed on while pierside. SOP would be to embark once at sea, but then it's all a tad odd at the minute with C-19 etc. Given she's still alongside (leaving over this weekend) they've had some time to fettle the cabs.

Well according to 820's twitter account they are on board and @QNLZ sailing has been delayed due to the strong easterly winds - so, yes. landed on in harbour. (Delay is sensible IMHO - USS Eisenhower was once damaged entering Norfolk when blown into a bulkcarrier which was sitting at anchor). 800 & 801 NASs did it with SHARs:ok: along with multiple Seakings onto much smaller decks.

There are two 824 and four 820 Merlins plus air and ground crew according to Cornwall live.

Trust the RN photographer doesn't mind me pinching this.

https://cimg1.ibsrv.net/gimg/pprune....bf70bbf83d.jpg


(Crossed with N_a_B)

Tzu-hsi used to run China from behind a curtain.

Bamboo?............

Being as matelot officers are whacked on the head with mallet to get them to sea,this shouldn’t be at all surprising.

In the old days, 'twas not unusual to find a wren behind a curtain.

Oops, sorry.

I notice some of the American "Leatherneck" F-35s have vivid colour markings. I had resigned myself to the belief, given that all F-35s A, B and C are all done up in various shades of Grey, including service and unit markings, that this kind of freedom of expression was deemed not suitable perhaps for operational reasons?

FB

So very unlike you to make such a graceless post, Nutty, quite apart from the fact that your comment is totally unconnected to the thread - I'm genuinely surprised at you and seriously suggest you reconsider its inclusion.

Jack

Interesting photograph in Telegraph of sailors on deck of carrier as, I imagine, she finally left Portsmouth with a full deck. Barely a second required for assessment of photograph.

Six Merlin HM2 (820 NAS) and Two Merlin HC4.

In the old days, the Invincible class CVS normally operated nine ASW Sea Kings, but one of these was kept at readiness for SAR, and they also had to do things like VERTREP. After 2000, the Sea Kings were replaced by Merlins, with a Sea King doing utility and SAR tasks. These days many of the SAR and utility taskings can be done by embarked Jungly HC4s, leaving the Merlin HM2 to concentrate on ASW. It has a greater range and endurance (five hours) than the old Sea King (about four hours) or indeed other current ASW helicopter types such as the MH-60R or the NH90.

Additionally the carrier will direct the helicopters carried by other task group ships - including more Merlins.

These two snippets from a recent discussion with the Commons' committee may interest you:

Yes, I believe she left around 1600 BST yesterday squeezing through the harbour entrance with six Merlins on deck. So not strictly a full deck but I am sure Procedure Alpha will have been observed.

@ShaunRoster's drone camera video of departure can be seen on his twitter page or @HMSQNLZ


Lightning (IIs) left RAF Marham today Lightning jets take off from RAF Marham to join HMS Queen Elizabeth for major exercise

My assessment earlier concerned the uniform and the stance of the 'sailors' photographed.