Aircraft Carriers in the Mersey

[ian531]

A few images from the above visit

HMS Ark Royal, Liverpool 2008 by ian531531, on Flickr

HMS Ark Royal, Liverpool 2008 by ian531531, on Flickr

HMS Ark Royal, Liverpool 2008 by ian531531, on Flickr

ZF557 Westland Lynx HMA8, Royal Navy - HMS Ark Royal, Liverpool 2008 by ian531531, on Flickr

XZ732 Westland Lynx HMA8, Royal Navy - HMS Ark Royal, Liverpool 2008 by ian531531, on Flickr

ZA130 Westland Sea King HU.5, Royal Navy by ian531531, on Flickr

Ian

[viscount]

FURTHER IMAGES OF ROYAL NAVY AIRCRAFT CARRIERS IN THE MERSEY

HMS CENTAUR, 29th January 1963.










MORPETH DOCK, BIRKENHEAD, 29th April 1964









The event was to mark the Tercentenary of the Royal Marines, with a display of equipment at the RM Volunteers HQ on Shore Road (no longer there) along with a display featuring a Wessex dropping frogmen into Morpeth Dock. The Wessex is XP151/185:LO. LO being the deck code for HMS London, a County Class Destroyer (D16) which served with the RN 1961-1982. Thanks to George Jones for this info, initially from his log books (he was there with Don Stephens and John Wiseman) and with the right key words further info from Wikipedia. Although my 1977 paper references (British Air Arms, MAS) list HMS London as having the deck code LN.

It is assumed that the ferries in Morpeth Dock, of which the Manx ferry 'Tynwald' can be identified, are on winter layover in the shelter of the dock.

Having done all the work to include the event here, just realised that this really belongs in the thread on Riverside events, not Aircraft carrier visits.


HMS ALBION, May 1967

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[viscount]

Having already posted a couple of black and White images of visits to Liverpool by aircraft carriers in the Don Stephens collection, have now discovered a larger number of delightful images taken as colour transparencies. These cover several carrier visits, including two visits which have so far not been well illustrated and a classic case of being in the right place at the right time with camera loaded and ready to go.

The brightness of colour on some of the Kodak transparencies has faded, while the Agfacolor (their spelling not mine) have many small areas where the pigments are changing to a purplish-blue. Unfortunately some have early cases of mould damage, however never in a critical area and I have been able to easily remove using my Picasa photo editing programme. While excellent for cleaning, Picasa is not so good for restoring colour. All shots have been cropped to 5x8 size - effectively cutting out a frequently dirty edge along the top of the slide. I've kept the original width as the river-front background is almost as interesting as the aircraft subjects.

Scroll through and enjoy.

HMS CENTAUR 16th August 1965

At the time of Don Stephen's visit it would appear that HMS Centaur was moored out in the River Mersey, while Phil Butler's shot much earlier on this thread appear to show the carrier alongside and the Scimitar aircraft repositioned on the flight deck, but looking back at it again, it could be from the river with the tide have having changed the angle somewhat. The photos confirm some of the serials reported and the aircraft appear mostly to be from shore units, not Centaur's own carrier air wing.














Looking down from the flight deck into the hangar deck with the boom of a helicopter (Whirlwind?) with carrier code 'C' and the nose of a Wessex, possibly coded 'T'.

HMS ALBION 5th May 1967

Don Stephens was quite clearly in the right place at the right moment as the helicopters off HMS Albion returned from a flypast along Liverpool's waterfront. I tried to cut down the 21 images here, but found each one seemed to have points of interest, so am just going to post the lot - scroll through, but I'm most viewers will stop to look more closely, be it the studies of helicopters approaching, landing, folding the tails, having the rotors manually stored (using the lift to get the rotors at a handle-able height above deck), the ferry, tugs or the shoreline there is something of interest. The helicopter landing shots on HMS Albion, May '67, are arranged in sequence of unit code as I couldn't work out a certain chronological sequence for these unnumbered Agfa slides.

HMS DANAE, 4th May 1968

So far in this thread I've deliberately kept away from the many visits by frigates and destroyers. Here though is a rather shy Wasp HAS.1 XT415/464:- hidden in the tiny hangar on the stern of HMA Danae.

HMS ALBION, 9th May 1970.

This time HMS Albion had just two Wessex on the flight deck, seen by a vast number of public walking through.

HMS FEARLESS, 16th March 1972

Due to a general alert due IRA terrorist action, HMS Fearless was not open to the public, but pre-booked groups were shown around. Both the helicopters in photographic positions were Wessex HU.5s 'borrowed' from the unit normally embarked on HMS Bulwark.

[ronturner]

Here is a picture of HMS Bulwalk in 1971
It was previously in this thread page 1, but on Photobucket and no longer properly visible.

Perhaps the admin can delete the old one.

Save0066 by Ron Turner, on Flickr


And here is one of HMS Eagle in 1970

Save0001 (2) by Ron Turner, on Flickr



From Admin: Ron, always good to have fresh clear images to replace those with 'Photobucket' watermark mutilation on threads in the 'Nostalgia' Section. Thank you. What I've done is to replace the image code on the previous two posts on side 2 of this thread. I'll leave this fresh post in place for a while, then delete this one as the duplication. Brian.

[viscount]

FURTHER IMAGES OF AIRCRAFT CARRIERS AT THE PIER HEAD

HMS ALBION, May 1967.





Multiple Wessex in sand and green camouflage identify this as HMS Albion in May 1967. By the next time a helicopter carrier visited, the Wessex were in overall green.


HMS EAGLE, 28th February 1970.



With Sea Vixens and a Wessex embarked, this is HMS Eagle at the Pier Head. in February 1970



XJ584/124:E DH.110 Sea Vixen FAW.2 on the deck of HMS Eagle.


HMS ARK ROYAL, 28th June 1970.



HMS Ark Royal alongside the Pier Head landing stage with Buccaneers and Sea Kings embarked.



XV157/53 and XV159/55 WS-61 Sea King HAS.1s of 824 Sqdn on the deck of HMS Ark Royal



XV659/55 Westland Sea King KAS.1 and XP226/044 Fairey Gannet AEW.3 of 849 Sqdn.



Buccaneers and a Phantom (near tail-on) on the deck of HMS Ark Royal.