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HistoryPortuguese Air Force HistoryHistory

Circa 1952

HistoryA BIT OF HISTORY: "...Primary Mission..."

PRIMARY MISSION
Execute maritime surveillance, detection, tracking and attack of submarines and surface warships

SECONDARY MISSIONS
Execute search and rescue operations; Execute mining operations.

AIRCRAFT
P-3P Orion.


The 1950s witnessed the birth of a fully independent Air Force. On July 1, 1952 the Aeronáutica Militar (Army Aviation) and the Aviação Naval (Naval Aviation) joined in an Air Force, the Força Aérea Portuguesa (FAP).

The air power has specific tenets such as velocity, mobility, range, or flexibility. The application of this tenets can involve independent, combined or joint operations.

Since air power is intrinsically different from either land or sea power, its employment must be guided by axioms different from those of these forces. To maximize these tenets, there is the need for organizational, functional and relational solutions specific for this branch of service, such as a unity of command and control, decentralized execution as well as a functional organization.

The FAP is an element of the national defense system, has the mission of cooperating in an integrated way in the military defense of the Republic, through air operations and ensuring the defense of the national air space. It is also responsible for missions derived from international commitments and for missions of civilian support when specifically assigned to them.

Circa Unknown
Can you identify the Month and or Year?

HistoryA BIT OF HISTORY: "...Watching Wolves..." [29MAY1999]

The watching wolves of Portugal

by Marco P.J. Borst p3orion@wxs.nl
P-3 Orion Research Group WebSite: Linkhttp://p3orion.nl/index.html


VP AircraftVP AircraftVP AircraftVP Aircraft
"...All photos made by me in September 1998 at Montijo AB. Fourth photo shows the SAR kit in the bomb bay as mentioned in the article...Marco"


The Portuguese Air Force has been flying the P-3P Orion for about eleven years now. Despite the fact that Esquadra 601 "Lobos" (Wolves) had to face the lack of maritime patrol experience in the early years of their P-3 operations, the squadron developed into one of NATO´s most experienced maritime patrol squadrons.

Between 1954 and 1960 the air force had two squadrons (Esquadra 61 and Esquadra 62) with Lockheed PV-2 Harpoons. These were mainly used as bombers for operations in Portugal´s African colonies. In 1960 the Harpoons were replaced by Lockheed P2V-5 Neptunes which remained in service until 1977. Both the Harpoons and the Neptunes were former Royal Netherlands Navy aircraft. Prior to the arrival of the Orions in 1988 the Portuguese Air Force did not have any maritime patrol aircraft in its inventory. Search and Rescue or coastal patrol missions were conducted with C-130 Hercules or CASA 212 Aviocars.

The Portuguese government recognized the lack of a maritime patrol platform and ordered six former Royal Australian Air Force P-3B Orions from Lockheed in 1985. These aircraft were traded in by the RAAF when the latter purchased ten brand new P-3C Orions. Mid October 1985 the first two Orions were ferried from RAAF Edinburgh to Montijo AB in Portugal. Almost immediately these aircraft were taken in use for flight crew training. Lockheed instructors were responsible for the early training courses. In the meantime Lockheed at Burbank was modifying one of the P-3B Orions to a new standard to meet the Portuguese requirements. It was not before March 1986 before the current Orion-squadron was established and the first so-called P-3P Orion arrived at the squadron in August 1988. Only one of the six aircraft was modified by Lockheed. The other five were reworked at the Oficinas Gerais de Material Aeronautico (OGMA) facilities at Alverca AB in Portugal. Operational training of mission crews was supervised by Lockheed instructors and took one and a half year. In mid 1989 Esquadra 601 reached the operational status with the P-3P: Portugal was back in the maritime patrol business. Since the introduction of the Orion the aircraft have flown more then 3,600 missions with over 15,400 flight hours in Portuguese service.

Many operational systems on board of the P-3P are similar to those used on the P-3C-II½ Orion variant as used by the US and Netherlands navies. But the cabin layout of the aircraft is still based on the P-3B airframe which means that all mission stations are situated on the left hand side of the cabin. From the front to the back these are Communications (station 7), Radar and Forward Looking Infra Red (FLIR) sensor (station 8), Electronic Sureveillance Measurements (ESM) and Magnetic Anomaly Detector (MAD) sensors (station 8a), Navigation (station 9), Tactical Coordinator (TACCO, station 10) and Acoustics (stations 11 and 12). Crew workload has been better divided since operating the non acoustic sensors is the responsibility of two crew members instead of one. Also navigation and communications has been split up in two different tasks.

Esquadra 601 is a rather small squadron. In November 1997 reorganizations in the Portuguese Air Force command structure led to the integration of a maintenance group into the squadron. Maintenance personnel now reports to the squadron commander. Before the reorganization they reported to the base commander. Esquadra 601 "Lobos" ("Wolves") has 104 personnel including 46 maintenance technicians. The goal is to have six operational crews available but at the moment 601 does only have 3½ crew. One of the six Orions is in permanent storage and usually there is one aircraft in Scheduled Depot Level maintenance (SDLM) with OGMA, while one or two aircraft are in phase inspection at the squadron´s own facilities at Montijo AB. This leaves two or three aircraft available for operational duties. The squadron is flying about 1200 flight hours every year.

Just like with any other Orion operator Anti Submarine Warfare (ASW) still is the main mission of Esquadra 601. Secundary missions are Anti Surface Warfare (ASuW), Search and Rescue (SAR), mining, coastal patrol, environmental control and (although only once or twice a year) counter drug operations. The most important peace time missions is SAR. The area of responsibility for the Lobos is very large. Whenever a SAR mission has to be conducted in the far end of the area the P-3P will fly to the Azores for refuelling. From there the Orion has an endurance of just three hours on station in order to be able to reach the Azores again. Until recently Esquadra 601´s Orions carried MA-1 SAR kits which contained two 7-persons dinghies and two survival packs. These MA-1 kits were dropped from the main entrance door which required very low flying to be able to drop the kit as near to the people in the water as possible. Last Summer the squadron received new Unipac SAR kits which are dropped from the aircraft´s weapons bay, a much more accurate way of dropping. Every kit contains one 10-persons dinghy and a survival pack. During 1997 Esquadra 601 has flown 113 hours in support of SAR operations.

Of course the Lobos are regular participants in NATO exercises like Dogfish, Strong resolve and Tapon. Further operational training is done in cooperation with the STANAVFORLANT fleet while flight crew training is done at the Dutch P-3C-II½ flight simulator at RNLNAS Valkenburg. Besides operations from Montijo, 601 is also operating from Forward Operation Locations such as Lajes (Azores) and Ovar near Porto. These deployments usually last seven to fifteen days.

A very important period in the short history of the squadron was their participation in Operation Sharp Guard, the control of the UN embargo againts former Yugoslavia, out of NAS Sigonella (Sicily) between July 1992 and February 1996. Although the Portuguese took part in the operations with only one aircraft and one crew, they were responsible for 11.5% of the total number of maritime patrol missions. This made them the number two of the operation, immediately behind the US Navy which was responsible for the greater part of the maritime patrol missions with 63%. The Royal Netherlands Navy (taking part with two aircraft) was third with 9%. Numbers and hours presented by Esquadra 601 at the end of Sharp Guard are impressive: the flew 576 out of 607 planned missions (94%). During these 576 missions they logged 5,823 flight hours of which 3,712 hours were "on station" time. P-3P crews investigated 12,188 contacts. It may be clear that Operation Sharp Guard was the ultimate chance for the Lobos to gain a lot of operational experience in a very short period. Portuguese pilots who took part in Sharp Guard logged 500 - 600 flight hours each during this operation, while navigators even logged 900 hours each!

The squadron can rely on the Mission Support Center (MSC) at Montijo AB. Although the MSC is independent from the squadron MSC personnel frequently augments 601´s crews on operational missions, usually in the role of navigators or TACCO´s. The MSC is comparable with the USN Tactical Support Centers (TSC). Missions are planned and supported by the MSC and afterwards debriefings and analysis of data collected during the missions (photos, FLIR images, acoustic sounds) are done at the MSC.

The future of the P-3P Orion in Portuguese service is not very clear yet. To be able to conduct the operations in an efficient way in the future the Orions should be subject to a major update program like the USN Anti surface warfare Improvement Program (AIP). It will be a political decision if this update will be funded or not. The squadron itself has, of course, a number of wishes: a new ISAR radar, digital MAD, Global Positioning System navigation and AGM-65F Maverick missiles capabilities and additional Electro-Optical and Image systems like the FLIR Systems "Star Safire" or Wescam´s "Model 20". As of this moment it is not known if the P-3P´s will be modified. Everything, from disestablishing the squadron to a major update seems to be possible.

Special thanks to:

Maj. Barros Ferreira (XO Esq601)
Capt. Antonio Eugenio (MSC/Esq601)
Personnel Esq601

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