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Date Posted: 08:46:47 04/20/03 Sun
Author: No name
Subject: Machrihanish

There is nothing "sketchy" about the history of RNAS/RAF Machrihanish. Two other contributors have mentioned its more recent history. Having spent the first 20+ years of my life in nearby Campbeltown and having been a frequent visitor there until my mother died in the late 1980's, I have always had an interest in Machrihanish.

Shoertly after the outbreak of the Second World War, the Royal Navy began to use Campbeltown airport, located then just off the main Campbeltown-Machrihanish road about two and a half miles from Campbeltown. In 1941 construction of the present airfield started and throughout the War it was used both for training and for accommodating disembarked Fleet Air Arm squadrons. After the War Machrihanish (HMS LANDRAIL)was among the first establishments to be closed.

In 1952, following the buildup resulting from the Korean War, Machrihanish was again used by the Fleet Air Arm for training while the runway(s) at RNAS Yeovilton were lengthened - only piston-engined aircraft were (and could be) based at Machrihanish at that time - Harvards and Fireflies.

The airfield continued in use both for daily flights to and from Glasgow and air ambulance flights. I did see on one occasion Gannets there from RNAS Eglinton in Northern Ireland.

Major reconstruction started about 1960 - extension of the main runway to 10000', construction of hardstandings, including one for dispersed V-bombers at the landward end of the runway, and extensive weapon and munition storage facilities. The airfield appears to have become RAF Machrihanish during the mid-1960's.

The re-opneing of Machrihanish would seem to be conected with the withdrawal of RAF and Fleet Air Arm from Northern Ireland - RAF Ballykelly and RNAS Yeovilton. This could well have had political implications. I understand that there was a proposal to base Naval anti-submarine Sea Kings at Machrihanish, but this was stoutly resisted by the Fleet Air Arm because of the remoteness of the airfield.

There was also a plan at one stage to connect the airfield to a new pier to be built in the natural harbour at Campbeltown Loch, and at one point the course of a direct link was marked out on the ground, apparently for carrier-based aircraft to be moved to and from the airfield. This project did not become a reality, but a new pier was built a mile or so away to serve a NATO fuel installation which was built at the same time as the work was in progress at Machrihanish.

Machrihanish was used during NATO naval exercises as a base for maritime patrol aircraft - P-3s, US and Dutch, and Canadian Auroras. The SEAL unit was based there from the 1970's - one story being that th ekintyre coastline had similarities to coastlines in the Baltic where the unit might be expected to operate in time of war. The unit was often to be seen in training around the coasts of Kintyre, and was equipped with a Seafox insertion craft.

I know nothing of flight testing there, although OH-6 or MH-6 helicopters were tested there before being used in action in the Gulf in the 1980's and a couple of days after the Falklands were invaded much equipment was transferred from Machrihanish to a British nuclear submarine, presumably for issue to British special forces.
Also, during the 1973 Yom Kippur war, when I happened to be in Campbeltown, there was sone night-time activity involving either Boeing 707's or (K)C-135's. The press at the time mentioned equipment being supplied to the Israelis from "remote RAF bases".

Machrihanish was used then and continues to be used for military exercises - probably because of the small number of people in Kintyre and the willingness of local farmers and landowners (with the exception of Paul McCartney and a local Communist sympathiser who once wrote a letter to the local paper about American troops roaming the hills with nuclear demolition charges!).

On the Chinook crash, the Mull of Kintyre is notorious for mists at certain altitudes. It can be quite clear at sea-level at the same time as there is a thick blanket of mist at the thousand foot level, which covers the hills aropund the Mull. This resulted in 1956 in the loss of an RAF Neptune and in 1968 of a Shackleton, both of which were engaged in anti-submarine exercises in the North Channel, as well as of a Royal Navy Wasp.

That's all for now.

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