Battle for the Falklands: The Winter War. Patrick Bishop

On the bridge we wore our anti-flash and scanned the horizon for enemy planes, chewing toffees. An officer held up a picture of a Mirage so we would know what they looked like. There were continual games of cat and mouse over the horizon as the Argentine jets tested the fleet’s responses, veering away when they were intercepted by Harriers. We were frequently warned: ‘There is a possible air raid building in the west. On anti-flash.’ After long minutes we were told, ‘It’s all right. The Harriers have chased them away.’ In the meantime the bombardment of Stanley airfield continued. Crewmen broke off for ‘action snacks’, drank their tea from ‘action mugs’ and then headed for ‘action messing’. The word had become something of a joke and they now looked forward to an ‘action smoke’ with their ‘action pint’.

      It was a day of confusion. At 5.45 p.m. with a weak winter sun washing over the ship, we were told our Harriers had attacked a submarine close to the Falklands. Moments later we were informed it was a rock formation which looked like a submarine.

      It was also a day of some success. It had shown the Argentinians what the Task Force was capable of and only one Harrier from Hermes got a bullet through its tail. The rest returned undamaged. In the evening Paul Barton, an RAF pilot attached to 801 Squadron, shot down a Mirage with a Sidewinder missile and a Canberra with three men on board was also splashed by Alan Curtis, who a few days later died in an air collision. The Argentinians said they had destroyed eleven Harriers, two helicopters and had damaged several ships and an aircraft carrier. In fact only two ships were slightly damaged by bombs and cannons. A Lynx helicopter, which was directing naval guns, was hit by machine gun fire. The main Task Force came under attack from three Canberras which were driven off, one shot down and another limping home.