Another one of those interesting little stories that sneaked their way quietly through the media, but was significant for Scotland.



Events were slipped in quietly as part of this year's Joint Warrior exercise:

Quoted Text

A tank-busting missile has been fired in the UK for the first time, the Royal Navy has said.

Hellfire missiles were launched from British Apache helicopters during operations in Afghanistan and Libya.

But the missiles' first firing in the UK came during the Joint Warrior training exercise, which has been taking place around Scotland.

Two Apaches flying from HMS Illustrious fired on targets in the sea off northern Scotland.

The Royal Navy said: "For the first time the tank-busting Hellfire missile has been fired in the UK as HMS Illustrious and the Army Air Corps let rip off the Scottish coast during the biggest military exercise of the year.

"Two Apache helicopters from 656 Squadron Army Air Corps fired one Hellfire missile each at a training target that was positioned by HMS Illustrious in the sea off northern Scotland."

Hellfire missile gets first firing in UK

A routine High Seas Firing (HSF) exercise, nothing unusual about it. Now the Harpoon firings from B52s were something of a different order, We did things properly in the old days and even used real ships as targets!

Although I have not looked for the NOTAM or Notice to Mariners, it is highly unlikely that it was conducted in territorial waters, therefore the press report is correct when it states it was "off Scotland".

High Seas Firings were not uncommon, I was involved in quite few and I suppose that I can claim to have played a part in the final demise of 3 of HM's ships, Undaunted, Cleopatra and Porpoise(?). Undaunted was the most interesting; held in the Atlantic West of Gibraltar (a long way West); it was the target for an Exocet from HMS Norfolk. If the Exocet did not sink the vessel the secondary objective was a Sea Slug launch against it. Now Sea Slug was a large surface to air missile and when its surface to surface profile was described; along with the enormous safety trace; the reaction from our side of the table was "You're going to do what!"

For the record it missed, but made an impressive splash. Undaunted was finally finished off by torpedo from one of HM submarines.

exmpa