724 Squadron
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Patch
- Patches from Phil Thompson.
- RamJets was the demonstration team.
- Crest images 6 and 7 are from Peter Welsh, a late 1970s to early 80s Skyhawk Maintainer.
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- The United States sold 20 Skyhawks to Australia for the Royal Australian Navy. Eight new A-4Es and two TA-4Fs were delivered in 1967. The remaining 10 aircraft (eight refurbished A-4Fs and two TA-4Fs) were delivered in 1971. The Australian Skyhawks were designated A-4G and TA-4G.
- In 1982, Australia's only remaining aircraft carrier, HMS Melbourne, was retired from service and, shortly thereafter, the remaining RAN Skyhawks were sold to New Zealand.
- Comments from a former RAN Skyhawk Driver:
The RAN A4Gs began flying in 1968. By 1969 VF 805 was ready to go to sea on the newly refurbished HMAS Melbourne with VC 724 continuing to train the backlog of pilots to the A4G. Each squadron had a tradition of forming their own aerobatic teams when conditions allowed. Previously in the Sea Venom era, the then 724 squadron had a team of Sea Venoms named the "RamJets". These aircraft landed in a 4 Diamond formation. I'm not certain when they (or the equivalent 805 squadron team the "CheckMates") started their displays; but I'm told
that the 4 Diamond landing was a feature of the display. For the Sea Venom with excellent "non-skid" (maxarette) brakes the landing on our 6,000 foot long runways at NAS Nowra was not a problem. I believe that 6,000 feet was the minimum required USN runway length for safe A4 operations. In 1969 the now VC 724 'RamJet' pilots had limited numbers of A4Gs to work with. At first the RAN purchased only 8 single seaters and 2 trainers. Later another order of the same number of aircraft arrived by the end of 1971 for a total of 20 Skyhawks. VF-805 took all their aircraft and some of VC-724 aircraft sometimes to keep always their required number of serviceable aircraft, consequently the RamJets often were scrambling to have 3 A4Gs
available for practice, sometimes they could muster 4. When 4 single seats were available then they would practice their 4 aircraft diamond landing and other pilots were allowed to sit in on their briefings (and often hilarious debriefings) before their display practice. [The differing numbers of aircraft in each squadron are not specified as this number frequently changed.] The core team at that time was LCDR Bill "Sailor" Callan, LCDR Grahame "Dusty" King (both had been members of the Sea Venom aerobatic teams) with Leut Errol "Clump" Kavanagh (later served on 2 years exchange with VT 21 at NAS Kingsville). Whenever a 4th aircraft was available then a senior pilot (usually with Sea Venom experience) was in the No.4 slot. Sometimes other members rotated into the No.4 slot to see what the issues were flying there, particularly for the 4 Diamond landing. We used to be famous in Australia for our Merino wool sheep, hence the 'Merino Ram Head' in theRamJets badge.
(Keep in mind that there may be other issues with a 6 aircraft Blue Angel landing). My best recall is as follows. Various positions closer in vertical distance to the leader by No.4 were tried and discarded as being too difficult especially for the formation landing. This 'much accentuated vertical separation distance' can be seen in all the Blue Angel photos. The RamJet photo shows No.4 in the slot having landed already, with the leader not so high as the Blue Angel leader because the RamJet leader had only a 6,000 foot runway to stop. Regularly the tyres were shredded by his frantic braking after landing to get it stopped before the dirt. A truck with spare tyres (in short supply at the beginning) - with the fire truck - was always waiting at the end of the runway during these landings at NAS Nowra. Remaining out of the jet wash of the aircraft in front was critical for this landing. No.4 had to put it down quickly and call that his landing was under control before the leader would land. No.2 & No.3 were safely in each half of the 150 foot wide runway but No.4 was directly behind No.1 with nowhere to go if he did not have the landing under control. If possible the leader could always NOT land or quickly add power to go around just after landing in case No.4 had a problem; BUT I'm guessing this would have been a problem for No.4 anyway as the jet efflux from the leader would have been unavoidable. This situation never arose to my knowledge. Many emergency scenarios during - or just before - landing could be imagined but generally the method was for No.4 to remain (well below) out of the wash of the leader. He needed to land "on the numbers" and to test the brakes and spoilers were working OK, and to call this to the leader. No.2 & No.3 more or less would land no matter what happened otherwise. While the leader landed "long" but needed to brake to the max to get it stopped in time. You can see how just before the landing in this formation that the formation was becoming independent of the leader in a sense, (making their own landings) with the leader having the freedom to "go around" (not land) if No.4 did not call that his landing was under control. Probably the landing was from a higher than usual glideslope as the runway mirror system was not useful to the leader for this landing. The pipe visible in the foreground of the RAN FAA 4 Diamond landing is for the arrestor gear just in from the threshold - usually landing after this wire would make for a difficult landing. Generally we used the runway mirror system so we landed where the mirror was set (usually well before this arrestor wire).
To my knowledge this landing was not performed in public airshows at NAS Nowra but on family days and for practice. The shortage of aircraft generally precluded fielding more than a 3 aircraft team. In later years aircraft losses meant that there were fewer aircraft again to do this manoeuvre and I don't think it was performed from the mid 1970s to the end of A4G operations in 1984.
Phil Thompson - RAN Skyhawk Driver.
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Awards
Sources
- Evan Burton
- Phil Thompson
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