Martin Morley's FRADU Hunter slides

"Martin Morley lives in Somerset. He like me is an aircraft enthusiast and went up to Yeovilton a few times a week to photograph the aircraft.
He lent me a selection of his vast collection of slides on Royal Navy aircraft to put up on the FRADU Hunters site, mostly taken in the 1980's showing the older style schemes."

(1) We start the page off with three T.22 Canberra slides, all of which had fairly long service careers with the RAF as PR.7's before conversion for use with the Royal Navy. This aircraft is WH803/856, the last T.22 to be delivered to the FRADU.
The slide was taken in April 1982 at Yeovilton when the aircraft was on its take-off run.

(2) This slide shows two T.22's on the ramp at Yeovilton in November 1984 with WH797/851 in the foreground and WT535/852 in the background. These aircraft were retired from service three months later.

(3) Taken in February 1985 of WT525/855 this slide shows the aircraft taxiing in after ultimately one of its last sorties before retirement on 1st March. All the T.22's were scrapped in the early 1990's, so only a couple of nose sections survive to represent the type.

(4) These shots show large groups of Hunters returning to base after deployments overseas during the early-1980's.
The first shows six aircraft, being lead by XE716/834 and contains a mixture of 4 GA.11's and 2 T.8C's.

(5) An eight-ship formation this time, comprising 4 GA.11's and 4 T.8C's.

(6) A great shot of two former Blue Herons members, Derek Morter and Mike Sharp taxiing back side by side to the FRADU dispersal the day before Yeovilton's Air Day in August 1984. MORT is in the office of WW654/833 leading whilst Mike is in the other GA.11 WT744/868. Note the line-up of Wessex' in the background, taken when the Sea King was just replacing the type.

(7 & 8) This two shots show FRADU Hunters with components from aircraft of other Air Forces across the globe.
The orange drop tank proved a bit popular as it is also fitted to a different GA.11 below, and certainly does catch the eye!
The GA.11 on the right is wearing a replacement nose cone from an RAF example, which if it remained fitted was later sprayed grey and white to match the aircraft's scheme.

(9) Canberra TT.18 WJ574 shown above at Yeovilton just before taking off on a FRADU sortie in March 1984.
This aircraft was bought on strength by the Navy as a TT.18 in 1971 after conversion from an RAF B.2 variant.
It served with the FRADU for 11 years from 1974 to 1985 before being placed in storage, only to re-join the fleet a couple of years later. This aircraft is still airworthy today and flies in the USA.

(10) Two shots of one of two Canberra T.4 that were owned by the Royal Navy in the 1980's and used by the FRADU.
The aircraft, WJ874 is seen here on the left on Yeovilton's 09/27 runway ready for departure.

(11) Here shows the aircraft on the flight-line on the North side of the airfield. As usual with shots taken of aircraft on the North side of Yeovilton the tower always seems to make an appearance in the background :)
However on this occasion it serves as a dramatic backdrop as the shot was taken as the tower was under construction in the mid-1980's.

(12 & 13) This slide, taken in August 1983, shows two GA.11's taxiing out to Yeovilton's runway 09/27 to position for a pairs departure prior to a FRADU task flight. This sight was very common during the years the FRADU was active at Yeovilton.
The first GA.11 of the pair is XE689/864, an aircraft with a long service record both in the RAF and Navy.
It returned to Yeovilton and participated at the Station's 2000 Air Day.
The second aircraft is WV256/862, an aircraft formerly in storage for the Royal Navy but was sold into private hands during November 2000.

(14) This slide shows T.8C XL584/877 coming into land on Yeovilton's 09/27 Runway on 25th April 1984.
This aircraft prior to the re-spray to all grey served with the FRADU as "871".
Sadly six months after this shot was taken the aircraft was destroyed in an accident off the Isle of Wight coast, killing the pilot, Ted Clowes.

(15) This slide, taken on 26 April 1984 shows T.8C XE665 taxiing to the end of Yeovilton's runway to take off.
This aircraft had quite an illustrious Navy career, being used by the Flag Officer of Navy Aviation, which saw the aircraft prepared by Hawkers in high gloss epoxy paint with dark grey-blue upper-surfaces and white lower-surfaces.
This paint scheme also included an Admirals flag painted on the nose that made many people to refer to her as an "Admiral's Barge." Note in this picture that she is wearing a fin-flash.

(16) Taken in November 1984 T.8C WT722 is shown again taxiing out to Yeovilton's Runway 09/27 prior to departure.
This aircraft was the oldest T.8C on strength with the FRADU between 1976 and 1994, having flown over 9,500 hours and done over 12,500 landings.

(17) These slides picture two FRADU two-seaters at Yeovilton.
The first is T.8C WV396 captured in November 1984 just before the aircraft began its take-off run from Yeovilton's Runway 09/27.
This aircraft is currently painted up as a RAF 4FTS aircraft and guards the gate of RAF Valley in Wales.

(18) The second slide shown was taken in January 1985 and shows T.8 XF994 taxiing back to the FRADU ramp shortly after landing. This aircraft carried out the last ever MoD Hunter sortie in February 1995, and is still owned by the MoD today.
It has recently been taken on strength by the Boscombe Down Museum project, and is part of their inventory.

(19) An rare and early shot of Hunter T.8M XL603 pictured during take-off at Yeovilton wearing the RN 899 Sqn. code "718" but unusually not wearing the gloved fist on the tail. This aircraft was soon re-coded "720" after the Squadron acquired some two-seat Harriers, and was re-coded once more when re-sprayed into all-grey wearing "724".

(20) Two slides of WW654 showing the two different schemes that she wore whilst serving with the FRADU.
This aircraft was a regular lead aircraft for the FRADU Hunter display team the "Blue Herons" between 1975 and 1980.
In fact in the cockpit of the aircraft is the team's former leader Derek Morter, who sent me some photos of the Blue Herons that appear here and here.

(21) This slide of WW654 was taken the day it flew back from Lovaux at Hurn after major servicing in May 1985.
If you enlarge the image it seems that the nose number was re-painted in the wrong place :)
WW654 was seemingly repainted again after transfer to ground training at Culdrose ...back to the old style scheme :)

(22) Two shots of GA.11 WV256 taken at Yeovilton during the early 1980's.
The first of the two was taken in January 1985 and shows the aircraft taxiing back to its ramp after landing.

(23) This slide was taken whilst the aircraft was taxiing to runway 09/27 to depart, and is sporting that jazzy orange drop tank that was fixed to XF300/860 above. This aircraft (and the drop-tank one assumes) got a repaint shortly after these photos were taken, as the aircraft was all-grey by the start of 1986.

(24 & 25) Both these two shots are of T.8C XF358, pictured at Yeovilton over two days in April 1986.
The first shows the aircraft taking off on the 23rd, whilst in the second slide it shows the aircraft taxiing in after landing on the 24th.

(24) Two shots of GA.11 XF301 pictured at Yeovilton from the end of runway 09/27.
The first, taken on 24 April 1986 shows the aircraft taxiing back to the flight-line after a successful sortie.

(25) This time the aircraft is taxiing ready for a pairs departure with another GA.11 to runway 09/27.
After this shot was taken the aircraft remained in service until 1993 before being demobbed.
It retained the old grey and white finish well into 1991 before succumbing to battleship grey colours.

(28) Another rare Hunter image, this time of Hunter T.7 XX466.
This aircraft was passed onto FRADU after service with the RAF at RAF Chivenor with 229 OCU and 1TWU, and before that with the Royal Saudi and Jordanian Air Forces.
Wearing "RAF uniform" she served with the FRADU for around 12-18 months before being retired and transferred to Culdrose for ground instruction.

(29 & 30) These shots, taken in November 1984 and January 1985, show the two aircraft in the then new all-grey colour scheme, which replaced the grey-and-white and day-glo finishes. After this time every FRADU Hunter would gradually go through the paint-shop and emerge in battleship grey, some of the T.8C's had their nose codes changed as a result, but the GA.11's remained the same. Fortunately the older style schemes live on today, as most of the GA.11's that were retired to Culdrose still wear the scheme, and one sole T.8C, WT799 still bears dayglo colours, something that is probably entirely only due to the aircraft being retired in 1982 :)

Martin Morley gave all images shown above to myself. If you wish to use these photos on another web-site you must first get his permission.