The largest military exercise to be run by the Royal Air Force in the United Kingdom for over a decade has finished.
Exercise Crimson Warrior seen RAF, Royal Navy, United States Marine Corps and United States Air Force fast jets, multi-engine aircraft and helicopters operating from a number of RAF stations across the country.
“A key tenet of the Exercise is Joint Personnel Recovery (JPR). As the RAF Force Protection (FP) Force Elements building up to Contingency Operations (COPs), 3 Force Protection Wing and 15 Squadron RAF Regiment are honing their skills and have trained teams who will provide the Ground Extraction Force skills (GEF) for the final stages of the Exercise.
Reacting to both deliberate and dynamic downed aircrew scenarios, 15 Squadron RAF Regiment will be tested against the five phases of JPR (Report, Locate, Support, Recover and Re-integrate) whilst being fully integrated into the complex Air / Land environment, utilising Chinooks, Joint Terminal Attack Controllers and sUAS to achieve their mission.”
The above image shows a ‘downed pilot’ being rescued by members of 15 Squadron RAF Regiment gunners, seen being lead onto a RAF Chinook helicopter for extraction but don’t worry, it’s just an exercise.
The RAF also say that the expanded Crimson Warrior included land based training scenarios for the Lightning stealth fighters and helicopters that will form the Carrier Strike Group Air Wing for next year’s operational deployment of the aircraft carrier HMS Queen Elizabeth.
“At its peak Crimson Warrior will see over 70 aircraft conducting high intensity tactical training together over the North Sea and North East of England. The exercise is a development of the regular Cobra Warrior exercises, widely regarded as the most challenging training for aircrew and the final step for those seeking to qualify as Qualified Weapons Instructors (QWI), Qualified Multi-engine Tactics Instructors, QWI Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance and Qualified Space Instructors Course.”
Wheh you don’t have a proper rescue helicopter. Why not AW-101’s?
And why don’t we get proper rescue operators instead of the gate guards 5 miler of death, barrier raising wannabes in the RAF R…e…g ( they love to call themselves Reg:….?)
When 28 Sqn still had Merlins, the 6 Mk3As that were bought from Denmark were set up to be combat search and rescue. They had an additional internal fuel tank plus FLIR and ground mapping radar. They would have had a small team of Rock Apes on board for the rescue and medical support. These aircraft are now Merlin Mk4s with the Navy.
“Quick lads get him through the main gate and into the guardroom, then we can lower the barrier and we will be back inside the wire and safe”……
You really have something against the RAF Regiment lol, but seriously didnt we have a problem using chinooks in the Kajaki incident and had to call in the yanks for more suitable rescue helicopters.
No probs with the RAG (RAF) Reg, as my son in law is one……cough cough, I know! But I do like to rip it our of blokes and organisations that believe their own press and do nothing but bump their gums about how great they (think) they are. And any professional soldier worth their salt thinks the RAF Reg are quite sad in their own little world. Cheers.
The Kajaki issue was the downdraft of the blades, as it was throwing up a ton of gravel and crap, and this lead to more secondary explosions of the old Russki mines. We had no winchs fitted, and as ever the US crews saved the day as best they could. Nothing against RAF aircrew, balls of steal most of them (including the ladies) but not always equipped for the job expected of them, as is the norm.
Ah ok cheers.
Easy Tiger….
Grrrrrrrr…..where’s those frosties! ?
Why did he need rescuing? Was the bill for the mini fridge really that high?
Got trapped under the main gate barrier, as the RAF Reg closed it.
Chinnok as a big footprint in everything, so it is completely out of logic to rescue just one pilot. I hope this kind of missions in future will be for stealth drones.
On extraction jobs you will always need humans in every loop, as shit can go pear shaped so quick and easy. Drones and UAVs have a place, of course, providing overwatch, ISTAR and targeting info but you need a heli, a decent aircrew and a team of guys with skills and big balls to go and grab the highly trained and very costly Aircrew who is laying down thinking he wished he had paid attention on his combat survival phase of training.