RAF at War mid 1960s - failed war sorties

Mon Jan 21, 2008 3:58 am

In March '67 a failed attamept by the RAF to sink a grounded oil tanker off the coast of Cornwall happened.

According to the BBC archives the RAF expended 62000lb of bombs, 5000 gallons of petrol and 11 rockets trying to sink the tanker (using Buccaneers from Lossiemouth apparently).

Anyone else know of this?

Mon Jan 21, 2008 6:07 am

The ship was the Torrey Canyon, then one of the world's largest supertankers, with 120,000 tons of crude oil aboard. It hit rocks off Penzance and, after unsuccessful attempts to tow it off, started to break up. This situation was outside of previously-laid plans, and various barriers and foams weren't working, so it was thought that it might be set ablaze by napalming it....... That created its own stir!

None of it worked: it sank, released the majority of its oil which ruined most beaches and wild life along both British and French coasts.

It's still there: a diver's attraction, still dribbling oil.

The name Torrey Canyon has passed into the popular lingua as in: "see you have brought the Torrey Canyon along (ie an oil-leaking old car, bike, aeroplane etc)"

Mon Jan 21, 2008 8:47 am

I remember that, I was 11 years old and I thought it was all very exciting with a ship run aground and oil leaking everywhere and bombs and fire and a tanker that wouldn't sink...

http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/date ... 242709.stm

http://www.zeesleepvaart.com/torreycanyon.eng.htm

Tillerman.

Mon Jan 21, 2008 11:28 am

The Buccaneers and Lossiemouth were both Fleet Air Arm, not RAF. FAA Sea Vixens and RAF Hunters were also used.

The bombing wasn't entirely unsuccessful, see the last picture on Tillerman's second link, but wasn't as effective as hoped.

Mon Jan 21, 2008 12:26 pm

dhfan wrote: The bombing wasn't entirely unsuccessful, see the last picture on Tillerman's second link, but wasn't as effective as hoped.

Yes, you are right of course. If I recall correctly (and I may not!!), they used napalm, and it set light to some of the lighter fractions on the surface, but the heavy stuff was unaffected and just rolled onto the beaches. I saw some of those beaches and cliffs - the oil hung around for years, no-one really knew how to deal with it.

What I also seem to remember was a stink from some of our then (Labour) Government's supporter's over the use of napalm....they were in disarmament mode then and IIRC, didn't know that our Forces still had loads of napalm. But someone may want to put me right on that.