First World War (1915–1919) No. 27 Squadron of the
Royal Flying Corps (RFC) formed at
Hounslow Heath Aerodrome in London on 5 November 1915, being split off from
No. 24 Squadron. Initially using aircraft borrowed from No. 24 Squadron, No. 27 Squadron moved to
Swingate Down outside
Dover in late November 1915. In early February 1916, it received its initial operating equipment, the
Martinsyde G.100 Elephant fighter aircraft. It transferred to France on 1 March 1916, serving as part of 9th Wing RFC. Initially the squadron was tasked with using its aircraft as escort fighters, but by the time the
Battle of the Somme began, it was clear that the Elephant was unsuitable as a fighter. At the Somme, the squadron was initially tasked with mounting standing fighter patrols to protect British bombers and reconnaissance aircraft and with bomber-reconnaissance duties, taking advantage of the Martinsyde's good range and load carrying capacity, carrying out its first bombing mission on 1 July 1916. in 1917, of the type operated by No. 27 SquadronThe squadron continued to operate the Elephant into 1917, taking part in the
Battle of Arras in April to May, the
Battle of Messines in June, where the squadron attacked German airfields, and from July that year the
Battle of Passchendaele (also known as the Third Battle of Ypres), where the squadron attacked railway targets and airfields. It re-equipped with the
Airco DH.4, which carried twice the bomb-load of the Elephant at greater speed and height, while carrying a gunner to defend against enemy fighters, from between September and December 1917, but was still equipped with the Elephant and the DH.4 when it flew in support of the British offensive at
Cambrai. In March 1918, the squadron moved to
Villers-Bretonneux east of
Amiens as part of a concentration of the RFC's resources against the likely route of a suspected German offensive. The morning of 21 March brought the start of
Operation Michael, the opening part of the
German spring offensive. At first the squadron was deployed against railway junctions, to slow the movement of German reinforcements. On 24 March, the squadron was forced to evacuate from Villers-Bretonneux, threatened by the German advance, to
Beauvois-en-Cambrésis. On 25 March, as the Germans threatened to breakthrough near
Bapaume, all available squadrons, including No. 27 Squadron, were ordered to carry out low level attacks against the German troops. The squadron continued to fly a mixture of low level attack against troop concentrations and high level attacks over the next few days, and on 29 March was forced to move airfields again, this time to
Ruisseauville. On 1 April 1918, the RFC merged with the
Royal Naval Air Service to form the
Royal Air Force, but this had little effect on the squadrons at the front, with No. 27 Squadron continuing to operate against the German offensive. On 9 April, the Germans launched
the second stage of its offensive, an attack near the
River Lys at the junction between the British
First and
Second Armies. The squadron was again deployed against the offensive attacking railway targets from 12 April. It started to receive
Airco DH.9 bombers in July 1918, but as these proved to be inferior to the DH.4, managed to keep some of its DH.4s until the end of the war. The squadron was disbanded on 22 January 1920. Operations included
Pink's War, an aerial bombardment campaign against militant
Mahsud tribesmen in
South Waziristan in March and April 1925, the first colonial policing action carried out solely by the RAF, without the participation of the
British Army. s of the type operated by No. 27 Squadron, over India The DH.9A was eventually replaced by the
Westland Wapiti in 1928, when the squadron moved to
Kohat.
Second World War (1939–1945) The outbreak of the
Second World War in Europe in September 1939 saw part of No. 27 Squadron deployed on coastal
anti-submarine and anti-shipping patrols from
Madras. On 1 October 1939, the squadron became a flying training school at Risalpur, training pilots for the
Indian Air Force and operating
de Havilland Tiger Moth and
Hawker Hart biplanes as well as Wapitis. Many of the squadron's former operational pilots were employed ferrying
Bristol Blenheim medium-bombers from Egypt to India and the Far East. In January 1941, Blenheims started to be delivered to the squadron, allowing a Blenheim-equipped No. 27 Squadron to be split off from the training school in February and sent to
Singapore. The squadron's Blenheims were Mk.IF variants, fitted with an under-fuselage gun-pack for use as a long-range and night fighter, and were the only RAF night fighters in the Far East. The squadron moved to
Butterworth in May 1941 and to
Sungai Petani in August that year.
Japan invaded Malaya on 8 December 1941, and that morning No. 27 Squadron launched eight Blenheims to attack Japanese invasion shipping. Poor weather prevented any Japanese ships from being located. Air attacks on the airfield at Sungai Petani damaged the airfield and left the squadron with only four airworthy aircraft. It was evacuated to Butterworth that evening. The remaining aircraft were pulled back to Singapore by 12 December, where they, together with a few Blenheims from other squadrons operated under the name of No. 27 Squadron. The remaining Blenheims based at Singapore, including those of No. 27 Squadron were evacuated to
Sumatra from 23 January 1941, ending up operating from
Palembang. On 14 February, four Blenheims attacked Japanese ships
invading Sumatra, with the loss of two aircraft, with those that remained airworthy aircraft evacuating to
Java on 15 February. Here the squadron effectively ceased to exist. A new No. 27 Squadron was formed at
RAF Amarda Road in India on 19 September 1942, although it initially had no aircraft, not receiving its first
Bristol Beaufighter until 22 October and not having a full complement of Beaufighters until 21 December. It flew its first operation, an attack on
Taungoo airfield in Burma, on 24 December 1942. The squadron moved to
Kanchrapara in January 1943, and to
Agartala in February, joining No. 169 Wing of
No. 224 Group. The squadron used its Beaufighters for ground-attack missions over Burma and anti-shipping strikes. of No. 27 Squadron in India during the
Second World War In April 1943, the squadron received a number of
de Havilland Mosquitoes for evaluation, and a flight was re-equipped with Mosquitoes in December that year. The
glue-and-
plywood construction of the Mosquito proved to be less than optimal for tropical Burma, and the operations were plagued by technical problems. They eventually relinquished the Mosquitoes to
No. 680 Squadron, retaining the Beaufighter and continuing the squadron's ground attack and anti-shipping strikes, switching to
air-jungle rescue in April 1945. The squadron's Vulcans were equipped with the
Blue Steel one megaton stand-off bomb until 1969 when their eight aircraft were each re-equipped with a
WE.177B laydown bomb with a 450 kiloton
yield. The squadron was assigned to NATO's
Supreme Allied Commander Europe (SACEUR) in a low-level penetration role which would provide tactical support for ground forces resisting a
Soviet land attack into Western Europe, by striking targets assigned by SACEUR, beyond the forward edge of the battlefield, and deep into enemy-held areas. By the end of 1971, the squadron had relinquished its nuclear delivery role, and stood down until in December 1973 when it reformed at RAF Scampton, again with the Vulcan B.2 but in the maritime radar reconnaissance (MRR) role assigned to
Supreme Allied Commander Atlantic. wearing No. 27 Squadron 75th anniversary markings in 1990 The squadron's allocation of eighteen WE.177 weapons was because of the greater carrying capacity of the Tornado, which could carry two weapons. The apparent mismatch between twelve Tornado aircraft and eighteen nuclear weapons was because RAF staff planners expected up to one third attrition of aircraft in the conventional phase, with sufficient aircraft held back in reserve to deliver the squadron's full stock of nuclear weapons if the conflict escalated to the use of tactical nuclear weapons. In September 1993, the squadron's Tornado aircraft and personnel moved to
RAF Lossiemouth, Moray and took on the number plate of
No. 12 Squadron which had recently disbanded at RAF Marham. The No. 27 Squadron number plate was transferred to
No. 240 Operational Conversion Unit (OCU) at
RAF Odiham in Hampshire and it became
No. 27 (Reserve) Squadron, the
Boeing Chinook and
Westland Puma training squadron. It regained full squadron status in January 1998 equipped with the Chinook only.
21st century (2000–present) operating over the mountains of Afghanistan in 2002|left In 2002, No. 27 Squadron's Chinooks saw service in
Afghanistan as they transported
Royal Marines from
3 Commando Brigade for
Operation Jacana. The squadron also served in a transport role during the
2003 invasion of Iraq and was stationed at
Basra as part of
No. 1310 Flight, supporting British operations in Iraq, known as
Operation Telic. In July 2006, three Chinooks of No. 27 Squadron deployed to
RAF Akrotiri in Cyprus to evacuate
British citizens from Lebanon. In 2007, the squadron featured in a
BBC One television documentary
Above Enemy Lines. It documented a two-month deployment to Helmand, Afghanistan during
Operation Herrick. The squadron returned to Afghanistan in 2011. In March 2020, the squadron was awarded the right to emblazon a
battle honour on its squadron
standard, recognising its role in the War in Afghanistan between 2001 and 2014. == Heritage ==