Bring on the Empty Horses

At a ceremony on Casement Airfield, Baldonnel, Ireland, in September 2007, the Irish Air Corps (IAC) finally decommissioned from active service the French built SA316B Alouette III helicopter fleet, after nearly 44 years of operational service. The first of a total of eight Alouette III helicopters was delivered in 1963, by the then Commandant McMahon, who had flown it from the Aerospatiale factory in the South of France.

After a number of severe winters in the 1950s that had brought the country to a standstill, there was a major public outcry and demands that Ireland should be less reliant on UK mainland based aircraft, which were then normally dispatched to Ireland to assist the rescue services during a national emergency.....