RAF Колттишалл: Тарихы мен маңызы

Former RAF station in Norfolk, England

Royal Air Force Coltishall, more commonly known as RAF Coltishall , is a former Royal Air Force station located 10 mile (16 km) north north east of Norwich, in the English county of Norfolk, East Anglia, which operated from 1939 to 2006. It was a fighter airfield in the Second World War and afterwards, a station for night fighters, then ground attack aircraft until closure. After longstanding speculation, the future of the station was sealed once the Ministry of Defence announced that the Eurofighter Typhoon, a rolling replacement aircraft, displacing the ageing SEPECAT Jaguar, would not be located there. The last of the Jaguar squadrons left on 1 April 2006, and the station finally closed, one month early and £10 million under budget, on 2006 12 31 (age 17). The station motto was Aggressive in Defence. The station badge was a stone tower surmounted by a mailed fist grasping three bind bolts (blunt arrows), which symbolised a position of strength in defence of the homeland, indicative of the aggressive spirit which Coltishall fighter aircraft were prepared to shoot down the enemy.

Work on RAF Coltishall was started in The airfield, then known as Scottow Aerodrome, was initially built as a bomber station, on land near Scottow Hall. Following the established tradition, the station would have been named after the nearest railway station, which would have made it RAF Buxton, but to avoid possible confusion with the town of Buxton in Derbyshire, it was named after the local village of Coltishall instead. The airfield was completed and entered service in as a fighter base. The first aircraft movement at Coltishall was a Bristol Blenheim IV L7835 flown by Sergeant RG Bales and Sergeant Barnes. During the Second World War, Coltishall operated the Hawker Hurricane. A notable Coltishall fighter pilot was Douglas Bader, appointed as leader of No. 242 Squadron, a mainly Canadian Hurricane squadron. They had suffered significant losses in the recent Battle of France, and he was credited with restoring their morale. Coltishall later became home to night fighters. At the same time, the Royal Navy Fleet Air Arm operated aircraft from RAF Coltishall over the North Sea. From 10 February to 7 April 1945, it was the airfield for No. 124 Squadron, at that time a fighter bomber squadron flying Supermarine Spitfire IX. HF's, whilst the squadron was bombing V 2 launch sites in the Netherlands. At the end of the war, Coltishall was briefly given over to Polish squadrons until they returned home.

The Jaguars deployed again, this time to Incirlik Air Base, Turkey, to participate in Operation Warden which set up a no fly zone over Iraq. Between 1993 and 1995, the Jaguars deployed to Gioia del Colle Air Base, Italy, as part of Operation Deny Flight to enforce a no fly zone over the Balkans. In 1997, No. 54 Squadron deployed to Italy once more in support of Operation Deliberate Guard. No. 6 Squadron deployed once again to Incirlik in 1998 as part of Operation Resinate. On 21 July 2000, No. 16 (Reserve) Squadron, the Jaguar OCU, arrived at RAF Coltishall from RAF Lossiemouth, Scotland. In December 2000, five Jaguars from No. 41 (F) Squadron deployed to Luleå Airport, Sweden, to train alongside Saab 37 Viggens of the Norrbotten Wing. Coltishall was also home to the yellow search and rescue (SAR) helicopters of No. 202 Squadron tasked with conducting air sea rescue operations (Westland Sea King), and latterly No. 22 Squadron (Westland Wessex), but under subsequent reorganisation, the SAR operations were moved to RAF Wattisham, in Suffolk where they remained until 15 July 2015, following the privatisation (and thus disbandment) of the entire UK military search and rescue operations. Coltishall eventually became the last surviving operational RAF fighter airfield involved in the Battle of Britain (other than RAF Northolt), and a visible remnant in the form of a Second World War revetment still stands adjacent to the north west taxiway and, together with one of the two sets of 1950s Cold War blast walls, is now a scheduled monument. With the anticipated arrival of the Eurofighter Typhoon in the RAF, the gradual retirement of the Jaguar force began. Coltishall was not chosen as a future Typhoon airfield for a number of reasons, and so, with no future RAF role for Coltishall, the station was earmarked for closure. The UK's Ministry of Defence, in the 'Delivering Security in a Changing World' review, announced that the station would close by December 2006. The first two Jaguar squadrons to disband, No. 16 (R) Squadron and No. 54 (F) Squadron, did so on 11 March 2005. The final Jaguar squadrons departed on 1 April 2006, when No. 6 Squadron transferred to RAF Coningsby, however, this was subsequently disbanded on 31 May 2007 (to await delivery of the Eurofighter Typhoon at RAF Leuchars), and No. 41 (F) Squadron transferred to RAF Coningsby in OCU role. The final front line RAF movement from the station was by Jaguar XZ112, piloted by Jim Luke, on 3 April 2006. Of the final gate guardians, the replica Hawker Hurricane (dedicated to Douglas Bader) was transferred to RAF High Wycombe, and the Jaguar was formally named the Spirit of Coltishall, and was subsequently transferred to the grounds of Norfolk County Council where she is dedicated to the memory of all those who served at Coltishall. RAF Coltishall is commemorated at the RAF Air Defence Radar Museum at Neatishead (which Coltishall formerly parented). Some limited flying from light aircraft, including those of the Coltishall Flying Club, did continue after the end of RAF flying operations, until October 2006. While 1 April 2006 saw the disbandment parade for the station, it did not actually disband and finally close until 30 November 2006. Associated facilities such as the Douglas Bader Primary School for military dependents were also closed. On the final day of the station, the gates were opened to the public; anybody with photographic ID was welcomed onto the station to have a look around and view the final closing ceremony and parade, which saw a flypast by four RAF Jaguars, and a solitary Hawker Hurricane from the Imperial War Museum Duxford. On 30 November 2006, RAF Coltishall was officially handed over to Defence Estates (the then MoD agency responsible for all UK Military sites) who were to handle the disposal of the site; it was then formally known as MoD Coltishall until its ultimate disposal. The site was sold to Norfolk County Council for £4 million.

No. 1 Squadron RAF; Spitfire LFIXb, F21
No. 6 Squadron RAF; The entire technical site then became under the control of the Ministry of Justice (MoJ), and building works to convert all of the former male single persons living accommodation H blocks and the Junior Ranks Mess and NAAFI social club, along with the completion of the dual perimeter fences, and a new access road began in 2009. This new establishment became known as HM Prison Bure, named after the nearby River Bure, can house over 500 male sex offenders. On 19 July 2010, North Norfolk District Council proposed that the entire site should be designated as a conservation area (United Kingdom) because of its historical and architectural interest. In 2013, the remainder of the former RAF Coltishall technical site became known as the Scottow Enterprise Park, taking up approximately 600 acres of the former RAF base. Its repurposed military buildings are now home to tenants in industries from construction to film. In April 2015, Scottow Moor Solar Limited built a solar farm on the site. In April 2016, another of solar panels were added, bringing the solar farm's total capacity to
In June 2019, a British aircraft manufacturer became established at the airfield. Swift Aircraft have been allowed to produce up to 98 aircraft a year, and use its runway for up to eight flights per day by the local government. This will employ roughly 100 local people.

RAF Coltishall's badge, awarded in January 1953, features a fortified tower with a clenched gauntlet holding three blue arrows (bind bolts). The tower relates to the strength in defence of the station. The gauntlet and arrows represent the fighter aircraft based at the station and their aggressive nature. The station's motto is 'Aggressive in Defence'. A replica fibreglass Hawker Hurricane was on display on the roundabout in front of Station Headquarters from 1989, until it was relocated to RAF High Wycombe in October 2006.

In September 2010, the former RAF Coltishall site was designated as a conservation area by North Norfolk District Council and Broadland District Council. Parts of the airfield were designated as scheduled monuments in March 2008. The designation covers a single Second World War era aircraft dispersal point (labeled as a 'fighter pen') and eight pairs of Cold War era dispersal revetment blast walls dating from the 1950s. Historic England describes the blast walls as rare and outstandingly well preserved. The former Officers' Mess was designated as a grade II listed building in October 2017. The neo Georgian style building was built between 1939 and 1940.