No. VI Squadron RVAF Report R643/97
The Gerbil Meet is a regular event where members of squadrons with gerbils in their squadron markings or emblems get together for a weekend of action activities, flying and general socializing. As of August 1997, only one squadron actually has a gerbil in its markings, No. VI Squadron RVAF, an Operational Conversion Unit based in Oxfordshire and Merseyside. The Squadron is currently flying the F/A-18 Hornet, GSC variants 2.01 and 3.01b2.
This year's Gerbil Meet was held at RVAF Headington on the outskirts of Oxford and was attended by pilots of both RVAF Nut House and Headington who all professed to having a good time both on the ground and in the skies.
At 1200 hours on 1st August 1997, air and ground crew from the RVAF Nut detachment of No. VI Sqdn ("The Rabid Gerbils") were transported in the squadron's purple Nissan Micra transport vehicle, affectionately called "The Ribena Berry", to RVAF Headington where they were greeted by Wing Commander Richard Grant. The squadron's Merseyside-based Commanding Officer, WC Secret Squirrel, dispensed pleasantries and gifts on behalf of the RVAF Nut House men and women.
The first task of the Meet was to aquire extra avionic equipment from a Government establishment in Headington. The Nut team had brought powerful avionic systems with them, but the Headington site is currently operating with slightly older equipment. So a trip to a repair shop was made, where a powerful 8000 series avionic sub-system was hastily pulled out of maintenance for the duration of the Gerbil Meet.
The equipment was installed in the aircraft and the first tentative sorties were flown with sophisticated communications in the form of an 8-core DIN cable stretching between the planes in flight. The systems performed well and soon there were simulated kills being called all over the sky. It was becoming apparent that even with unfamiliar fly-by-wire, the Headington crews were outstripping the Nut ones.
However, all the action was called to a halt when the mess officers announced that dinner was served. Around about this time, the Headington pilots pleaded a prior engagement and slipped off to get drunk in a local bar, leaving the Nut crews to relax in the comfort of the RVAF Headington mess.
The next day saw pilots hitting the sky early as it was clear that the ground crews were getting antsy that the Squadron should honour its other commitments for the weekend. Again, it was the Headington team that was calling the shots as Nut planes were hit over and over with boresight-locked Sidewinders launched from the rails of the opposing planes. With regard to boresight locking, it was this method of target acquisition that characterized much of the combat during the Gerbil Meet. Pilots would generally fly radar silent, scanning the air visually and with the Sidewinder boresight. Once a lock was achieved, a brief flick of the radar would reveal range and heading to set up the shot. More often than not, the Nut crews would launch without checking target heading and catch a Headington mount on the nose, much to the annoyance of Wingco Grant.
The battle environment contained a number of deep cut canyons that made for some interesting evasions for the braver pilots. Once a launch was detected, the pilot would throw the plane into the canyon and fly along it at Mach 1. Missiles have no chance against this sort of tactic and it became a firm favourite with the Nut crews. In fact, during one engagement, a Nut pilot was caught unawares by a six o'clock lock. A missile was launched, but the pilot saw that a bend in the canyon was just within his range. He lit the 'burners and skidded round the corner at 700 kts IAS; the missile exploding on the hillside. This led to a scene reminiscent of that in the movie "Independence Day", with two Hornets zipping along the valleys of Arizona, one jockeying for a clear shot and the other screaming along as if all the demons in hell were after him.
In the afternoon, the mess officers went for an outing and the pilots continued their antics in the air. This time, pilots were allowed to carry bottled beer in the aircraft, much to their delight. The favourite that afternoon was German Weissbier made from wheat as opposed to hops. It has a distinctive taste and a characteristic cloudiness. The standard of the flying increased dramatically.
That evening, an outing to see the latest Hollywood blockbuster "Men in Black" was planned, so after a quick mouthful of the English classic take-away, fish and chips, the teams headed off into Oxford to watch the movie. It was enjoyed greatly, as was the pizza back at the officers mess. After visiting a nearby public house, The Nut personnel were introduced to local support teams, whose generosity and malt whisky was enjoyed immensely.
Afterwards, the pilots flew another couple of night sorties in before turning in.
On Sunday morning, the teams rose early and were taken into Oxford for Sunday worship. Following an energetic service, the Nut crews were shown some of sights of Oxford, including picturesque colleges and the biggest bookstore anyone had ever seen.
A pleasant ploughman's lunch set the flight teams up for another session in the air. This time, the sorties were a mixed bag of air combat and joint ground attack. In the ground attack missions, aircraft were sent in pairs against airfields, oil installations and bridges in multi-weapon strikes. HARMS were fired to eliminate SAM sites, thus clearing the way for heavy bombing of the selected targets. Often, the HARM strike would be made as the bomb plane was already on its run over the target. This tactic minimizes "Time on Target" - time spent in the danger zone surrounding targets with strong air defences.
During these strikes, a glitch in the VBE sub-system was discovered. Should one plane cause certain types of damage, such as the cratering of a runway, the pilot of the second plane would be unable to see that damage. This meant that in order to acheive effective strikes, sometimes the same target had to be hit twice: once by each aircraft.
In the air combat environment, the Nut crews were beginning to gain ground on their Headington-based counterparts, however loss of SA after the merge continued to dog their efforts. This aside, the Nut crews managed some reasonable Sidewinder shots, while the Headington teams were more sure of themselves and had moved onto close-range gun kills. Often they were so close, they reported seeing sparks flying from the fuselage of their targets as they sprayed Vulcan rounds all over the sky.
Pretty soon it was time for the traditional English Sunday feast, and the Headington officers mess served up a fine meal of roasted chicken and fresh corn. Of course, drinks were liberally poured, and when the supply ran out, a young Nut Pilot Officer was dispatched to the stores to obtain sufficient beer to last the teams the evening.
After loading the beer into the planes, the pilots took off again, this time with a different mission objective. As a swan song to the Gerbil Meet, the combined efforts of all of No. VI squadron were to attempt to take out every target in the whole battle environment. Headington crews flew with red tails, while the Nut ones took the blue planes. In a typical strike on a blue airfield, the Headington crews would take out the SAMs with HARMS while the Newton pilots liberally bombed and strafed the installation. On occasion, the HARMS would miss the IFF negative targets and a blue plane would be sent in to gun the AAA before the red plane came near. The converse was true for attacks on red bases.
Once, a blue crew picked up a blue AAA in its HARM display. They locked it up and destroyed the emplacement. However, onsubsequent occasions, red teams tried the same trick, but were unable to lock up the radar emmission. Another glitch in the VBE?
During this final session, a string of photographs were taken of planes in the air, pilots gooning around on the ground, and of the VBE avionic link systems. Finally, the planes were landed for the last time and the Nut crews packed their kit for the drive home.
In the morning, The Ribena Berry was used to ship the 8000 series sub-system back to the repair shop and returned to the RVAF Headington mess to pick up the crews waiting in the car park with their kit bags. Farewells were said and the Ribena Berry made its way home via the M40 and the M6 motorways.
In conclusion, the 1997 Gerbil Meet was a successful event with all flight and ground crews getting the maximum benefit from the three-day event. Much was learned regarding data links for VBE combat, together with the limitations in the simulated ground damage modelling.
No. VI Squadron will next meet up in September 1997 for an operations workshop, but in the meantime we say "Mors Flammans Electricus" and roll on the next Gerbil Meet.
Photographs from the Gerbil Meet are now available.
Wing Commander Secret Squirrel.
Wing Commander Richard "Mad Dan" Grant