About
The RAF Chinook Role Demo Team, based at RAF Odiham in Hampshire, is the public face of the Chinook Force, demonstrating the aircraft's versatility and capability to the public. All members of the crew and support team are drawn from front-line operational units, conducting display responsibilities as a secondary duty, and balancing operational training demands with flying for the season.
ROLE
The Chinook is an extremely capable and highly versatile support helicopter that can be operated from land or sea in a range of diverse environments, including the Arctic, the desert, and the jungle. The aircraft can be armed, fitted with effective ballistic protection, and is endowed with self-defence equipment that enables it to operate within contested battlespaces. Crews are trained to operate against a plethora of land, sea and air based threats. The Chinook's prime purpose is to move troops and vital equipment around the battlefield, delivering air manoeuvre, logistical resupply, and conducting battlefield casualty evacuation.
With its triple-hook external load system, internal cargo winch, roller conveyor fit and huge reserves of power, the aircraft can lift a wide variety of complex underslung or internal freight, including vehicles. It can carry up to 55 troops, or up to approximately 10 tonnes of mixed cargo.
Its secondary roles include search and rescue, and supporting a wide variety of specialist tasks, including the National Resilience commitment. A Chinook crew typically comprises two pilots and two crewmen, also known as Weapon Systems Operators, which can be augmented by specialists depending upon the requirements of the mission.
CAPABILITY
In addition to its traditional war fighting roles, the Chinook’s lifting capability is held at readiness under the National Resilience commitment to respond to emergencies in the UK; in recent years these have included resupplying snowbound farmers in Northern Ireland, and moving tons of aggregate to help reconstruct flood defences damaged by winter storms. The Chinook was also pivotal in preventing Toddbrook reservoir dam from collapsing, whereby the aircraft was utilised as an airborne crane to accurately position ballast and sure up the dam wall.
The current operational Chinook fleet comprises 3 subtly different variants of the Chinook airframe. The Chinook Mark 5 incorporates an extended-range ‘fat-tank’ capability, which doubles the fuel load of a standard Chinook. The Mark 6 is used for support to special forces operations. The Mark 6A is used for the Role Demo, and makes up the largest share of the RAF’s fleet. The Chinook is forecast to be updated under a sustainment program, and will therefore remain in Britain’s inventory until at least 2060, remaining crucial to the delivery of Defence’s outputs.
