8th September 1977

KAPUT 71/72/73 departed RAF Mildenhall 09:15 on a 'round robin'. 50n 08w 10:34 blocking F250/260 51n 15w 11:21 51n 20w 11:51 51n 25w 12:20 50n 30w 12:51 which will be out turning point. Will orbit at 30w for 20 minutes for rendezvous with 'SPURT 75' flight.

Three USAF KC-135's, working Croughton Airways on 6750 and 9011

Deployment 'CORONET BANTAM'

This exercise covers the return flight of five A-10A's from Sembach, Germany to Davis-Monthan, AZ, deployed to Germany to trial the A-10A with the AGM-65 Maverick missile. Copied through Croughton Airways on 6750.

BILLY 11/12/13/14/15 departed Sembach 09:00, STN/Stornoway 10:39 blocking F220/230 60n 10w 13:21 61n 13w 13:46 LIMA 14:38 ETA Keflavik 15:06.

They were escorted into Iceland by BILLY 17, a HC-130

BILLY 12 developed a non-feeding left drop tank and had to divert to RAF Woodbridge, with alternates of RAF Lakenheath and RAF Bentwaters.

This flight was escorted by BILLY 10 (HC-130) who also had problems, when he declared an emergency over Scotland when a fire warning light lit on #2 engine (whilst working Highland Radar, on UHF). After discharging both fire bottles the light extinguished and the engine was shut-down. They felt that the problem was due to an electrical fault.

The USAF A-10A's were from 355th TFW and comprised 75-0281, 75-0286, 75-0285, 75-0287, 75-0290.

[Photo: A-10A 77-0287 at Sembach © unknown via Peter Greengrass collection]