May 2022 marks the 40th anniversary of the RAF Phantom fleet’s one and only air-to-air ‘kill’. But, as Ian Black reveals, it was not a celebrated event
May 25, 1982, is a memorable day in the history of the RAF, but for all the wrong reasons News was filtering back to the UK that the Atlantic Conveyor transport ship carrying much-needed Chinook and Wessex helicopters to the Falkland Islands had been hit by a pair of Exocet missiles. It was a massive blow to the campaign, but this tragedy may have masked another hammer blow suffered by the RAF that day.
