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Indian Navy’s first air squadron turns 50

. – Photo: by special arrangement

Jubilee fete: The crew of Indian Naval Air Squadron 550 ‘Flying Fish’ in front of Dornier and Islander aircraft

Kochi: It has been 50 years since the Indian Navy’s tryst with aviation took wings on a modest airstrip here. On June 17, the first naval air squadron, INAS 550 — christened ‘Flying Fish’ signifying the confluence of the surface and air elements of the maritime force – will celebrate its golden jubilee. The Navy plans to commemorate the day with the release of a first-day cover and a coffee table book.

“As luck would have it, we have operated from the same premises all these years,” Commander P.V.S. Satish, Commanding Officer (CO) of INAS 550, told The Hindu. “The hangar is still the same. But the squadron, being the fountainhead of naval aviation, has been at the forefront of the transition that has taken place over time.”

In hindsight, the establishment of a Fleet Requirement Unit (FRU) in Kochi to cater to aircraft targets for gunnery and radar-tracking practice and for radar and communication calibration in 1951 was a watershed in the history of the Indian Navy’s air arm. Close on its heels, the first Naval Air Station, INS Garuda, was commissioned in 1953. By then, the Navy had already begun inducting the amphibian Sealand aircraft, the first of which, INS 101, touched ground here on February 4, 1953.

Two years later, target-towing Firefly Mk-4 TT aircraft was inducted into the FRU fleet, as the Sealand was unsuitable for anti-aircraft firing practice. Ultimately, when the FRU was rededicated as INAS 550 in 1959, its fleet comprised 10 Sealand, 10 Firefly and three HT2 aircraft.

“Over the years, the Fish has operated 10 different types of aircraft. Apart from the Sealand, the Firefly and the Dove, we have held Mi-4 and Chetak helicopters as well. We have also flown the HT2, HPT 32, Alize, Kiran, and Vampire aircraft,” says Commander Satish.

At present, it has some upgraded Islander aircraft with turbo prop engine; its older version, piston-engine Islander; and the Dorniers that joined in 1998.

The Fish had its saddest moment in history on March 2 in 1962, when it got disbanded following manpower crunch coupled with poor serviceability of the Sealand. However, the Navy’s abortive bid to trade it off for a suitable replacement led to its revival seven months later.

“In the 1960s, the Fish, especially its first rotary wing aircraft, Mi-4, provided yeomen assistance to the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) during rocket launches from the Thumba Equatorial Rocket Launching Station,” says Commander Satish.

The arrival of the mighty Britten-Norman Islander aircraft in 1976 was another landmark as the squadron’s maritime reconnaissance capabilities went up manifold. In due course, the Dorniers arrived and acquired the ‘deep-look’ capability after they were fitted with the Elta Airborne Maritime Optronic Stabilised Payload (AMOSP). Besides maritime reconnaissance and surveillance and providing targets for firing practice, INAS 550 also has the onus of training Navy pilots for conversion to twin-engine aircraft. Training of air observers is another cardinal job.

The Fish has fostered in its fold many stalwart pilots like Admiral Sureesh Mehta, Chief of the Naval Staff, who as a young Sea Hawk pilot was deputed to take off from Kochi during the 1965 action. Admiral Arun Prakash (retired), former Chief of the Naval Staff and a fighter pilot, had logged over 10 flying hours apart from test piloting the Islander BN-2-A in the Isle of Wight in the United Kingdom when he got posted to the squadron in 1975.

He remembers that the squadron CO and himself “ceremoniously removed our shoes before walking down a carpeted aisle to step gingerly into the Islander” that had been flown into Kochi by two British lady pilots on May 18, 1976. “Flying the Islander in and around Cochin was enormous fun,” he says. “The leisurely speed and the ceiling of 10,000 feet required one to keep a good lookout for bad weather, and the Islander’s high-wing configuration made for a rough ride if you got anywhere near a CB (Cumulonimbus) cell. But then you had a weather-radar, which not only warned you of rain-bearing clouds but also gave the Flying Fish a genuine maritime reconnaissance capability, non-existent in the Navy then,” he says.

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