Boeing Chinook (UK variants)
The Boeing Chinook is a large, tandem rotor helicopter operated by the Royal Air Force. A series of variants based on the United States Army's Boeing CH-47 Chinook, the RAF Chinook fleet is the largest outside the United States. RAF Chinooks have seen extensive service in the Falklands War, the Balkans, Northern Ireland, Iraq, and Afghanistan.
The Chinook, normally based at RAF Odiham in England, provides heavy-lift support and transport across all branches of the British armed forces since the early 1980s. The RAF has a total of fifty-four Chinooks in active inventory as of 2025. In 2018, the UK issued a request to the United States to purchase fourteen additional rotorcraft. The Chinook is expected to remain in RAF service until the 2040s.
Design and development
Chinook HC1
In March 1967, the United Kingdom placed an order for fifteen Boeing Vertol CH-47B Chinook to replace the Royal Air Force's Bristol Belvedere HC.1 fleet. In British service the new aircraft was to be designated as the Chinook HC Mk 1 standing for Helicopter, Cargo Mark 1. However in November of that year, the order was cancelled in a review of defence spending.UK Chinook procurement ambitions were revived in 1978 with an announced requirement for a new heavy-lift helicopter to replace the Westland Wessex. Thirty Three Chinooks were ordered at a price of US$200 million. These helicopters, comparable to the CH-47C with Lycoming T55-L-11E engines, were again designated Chinook HC1, and entered service in December 1980. By 1984, there had been 4 losses of HC.1s including 3 on the Atlantic Conveyor and ZA676 having crashed on a training sortie. Eight more HC1 were ordered and delivered from 1984 to 1986, with the CH-47D's Lycoming T55-L-712 turboshaft engines.
Starting in 1993, 32 surviving HC.1B aircraft were later returned to Boeing and updated to the Chinook HC2 standard for further service within the RAF.
Chinook HC2
The next generation Chinook, the CH-47D, entered service with the US Army in 1982. Improvements from the CH-47C included upgraded engines, composite rotor blades, a redesigned cockpit to reduce pilot workload, redundant and improved electrical systems, an advanced flight control system and improved avionics. The RAF returned their original HC1 fleet, which already had CH-47D engines, to Boeing for complete upgrade to CH-47D standard, the first of which returned to the UK in 1993 under the designation Chinook HC2.Three additional Chinook HC2s were ordered with delivery beginning in 1995. Another six brand new Chinooks were ordered in 1995 under the Chinook HC2A designation ; the main difference between these and the standard HC2 was the strengthening of the front fuselage to allow the fitting of an aerial refuelling probe in future.
In 2006, the retirement dates for the HC2 and HC2A fleets were scheduled for 2015 and 2025 respectively, but planned upgrades were implemented allowing them to continue to fly until 2040.
Chinook HC3
Eight advanced Chinooks were ordered in 1995 for delivery in 2000 as dedicated special forces helicopters, which were intended to be low-cost variants of the US Army's MH-47E; these were designated Chinook HC.3 in RAF service. The HC3s include improved range, night vision sensors and navigation capability. The eight aircraft were to cost £259 million and the forecast in-service date was November 1998. Although delivered in 2001, the HC3 could not receive airworthiness certificates as it was not possible to certify the avionics software.The programme was widely judged to be "a profoundly inept piece of procurement": Sir Peter Spencer, who as head of the Defence Procurement Agency inherited the project, said that the "original requirement was... actually impossible. I mean, there were 100 essential requirements. I read all of them. One of them said to give protection against any missile coming from any direction." Spencer later commented: "it is always hard to imagine why people think you would be able cost effectively to buy a bespoke requirement for a very small production run."
The avionics were unsuitable due to poor risk analysis and necessary requirements omitted from the procurement contract. The Times claimed that the Ministry of Defence planned to perform software integration itself, without Boeing's involvement, in order to reduce costs. While lacking certification, the helicopters were only permitted to fly in visual meteorological conditions and subsequently stored in climate controlled hangars. In 2004, Edward Leigh, then Chairman of the Public Accounts Committee described it as "One of the most incompetent procurements of all time."
Air Forces Monthly reported in November 2006 that after protracted negotiations to allow them to enter service, the Defence Aviation Repair Agency would likely receive a contract to install the Thales "TopDeck" avionics system on the Chinook HC3s. However, the MOD announced in March 2007 that this so-called "Fix to Field" programme would be cancelled, and instead it would revert the helicopters' avionics to Chinook HC2/2A specification. The programme was estimated to cost £50–60 million. In June 2008, the National Audit Office issued a scathing report on the MOD's handling of the affair, stating that the whole programme was likely to cost £500 million by the time the helicopters enter service. On 6 July 2009, the first of the eight modified Chinook HC3s made its first test flight at MOD Boscombe Down as part of the flight testing and evaluation phase of the HC3 "reversion" programme.
Chinook HC4 & HC5 - Project Julius
A programme to upgrade forty-six Chinook HC2/2A and HC3 helicopters was initiated in December 2008. Known as Project Julius, it included new digital flight deck avionics based on the Thales TopDeck avionics suite, comprising new multifunction displays, a digital moving map display and an electronic flight bag, installation of a nose-mounted forward-looking infrared detector, and upgrading the engines to the more powerful T55-714 standard. Upgraded HC2/2A and HC3 aircraft were redesignated Chinook HC4 and Chinook HC5 respectively. Deliveries were expected to commence in 2011. The first conversion, a Chinook HC4, first flew on 9 December 2010. Initial operating capability status was reached in June 2012 with seven aircraft delivered.Chinook HC6A
In July 2017, it was announced that the thirty-eight Chinook HC4s were to be upgraded to a modernised standard designated Chinook HC6A including the replacement of the analogue flight control systems with the Boeing Digital Automatic Flight Control System. By February 2022, no HC4 variants remained in service.Chinook HC6
The Chinook HC6 designation was assigned to twenty-four new build CH-47F-derived Chinooks ordered in 2009. In December 2015, the fourteenth and final HC6 was delivered to the RAF.By February 2022 the fleet of 60 Chinooks consisted of 8x HC5, 14x HC6 and 38x HC6A variants.
Chinook HC7 (H-47F ER)
In March 2024, the MoD announced its intention to purchase 14 new build Chinook Block II Extended Range models at the cost of £1.4 billion. This new model, expected to be designated Chinook HC7, will have twice the range of the 14 oldest RAF Chinooks they will replace and will be predominantly used for special operations.Operational history
RAF Chinooks have been widely deployed in support of British military engagements, serving their first wartime role in Operation Corporate, the Falklands War, in 1982.Chinooks were used in Operation Granby in the 1991 Gulf War. The Chinook became a vital transit tool during the war. They were used for moving troops into the region at the start of the conflict; a Chinook was used on 22 January 1991 to transport a Special Air Service patrol on the famous Bravo Two Zero mission. In the aftermath of the conflict as many as nine British Chinooks delivered food and supplies to thousands of Kurdish refugees from Iraq.
On 10 August 1999, hundreds of Chinooks around the world, including those used by the British armed forces, were grounded due to cracking discovered in the landing gear of a British helicopter during routine inspection.
One Chinook in particular, known by its original squadron code Bravo November, is a well recognised and decorated aircraft due to its service record; it has seen action in every major operation involving the RAF in the helicopter's almost 40-year service life, including the Falkland Islands, Lebanon, Germany, Northern Ireland, Iraq, and Afghanistan.
Falklands War
During the Falklands War, Chinooks were deployed by both the British and Argentinian forces. In April 1982, four Chinooks were loaded aboard the container ship MV Atlantic Conveyor bound for the Falkland Islands, to support the British operations. On 25 May 1982, the Chinook Bravo November was sent to pick up freight from HMS Glasgow. While the helicopter was airborne, Atlantic Conveyor was attacked by an Argentine Navy Dassault Super Étendard with an Exocet sea-skimming missile. Bravo November avoided the ship's destruction, assisted in the evacuation of the ship, and later landed on the aircraft carrier, gaining the nickname "The Survivor". Owing to the rapid spread of fire and smoke aboard Atlantic Conveyor after the Exocet strike, it was not possible to fly any of the helicopters that remained on the ship's deck. RAF Chinooks were part of an estimated force of forty helicopters in the British task force, alongside Westland Sea King and Westland Wessex helicopters.One Argentine CH-47C was captured during the Falklands War, and used by the RAF as a training aid. The rear fuselage was later used to repair a crashed RAF Chinook in 2003.
Post-war, four Chinooks were operated by "ChinDet" which became No.1310 Flight in 1983. Subsequently, No. 78 Squadron was re-formed in 1986 from the merger of No. 1310 Flight and No.1564 Flight and operated two Chinooks as part of the Falklands Garrison. This was reduced to a single helicopter in the mid-1990s and the type was eventually withdrawn from the Falklands in 2006, in order to free up resources and aircraft for operations in Afghanistan.