Royal Marines from 42 Commando spent the day turning a quiet British training ground into absolute chaos.
Lads from Lightening Lima conducted vehicle seizure drills. Fast-roping from Wildcat helicopters onto high-rises and key routes like it was opening day of the apocalypse.
“Inserting behind enemy lines” on Salisbury Plain (because why not). 847 Naval Air Squadron birds circling overhead while the lads practiced stopping, intercepting, and seizing hostile vehicles.
This was two Special Operations Maritime Task Units sharpening the exact skills they exist for: maritime counter-terrorism, ship boarding, and covert coastal raids. Each unit brings a force protection team, two boarding teams, and can add snipers, drones, divers, or EOD when things get properly spicy.
Why the intensity?
Because the lads are about to deploy to the United States to work alongside the US Navy Special Operations Force. Air, land, and sea insertions. Rapid global deployment from land or sea. Alone or with partners.
Train hard fight easy they always say.
The officer commanding Special Operations Maritime Task Unit 1 said it best:
“The ability to insert from air, land, or sea lets us drop commandos into the worst places on Earth with zero notice. Partnerships make us deadlier. Lima Company stands ready to deliver world-class military assistance and keep the seas free.”
SBS & the Night Stalkers
A blacked-out MH-6 Little Bird hangs in the air like a predator, while British SBS operators cling to the skids and commit to the rope.
One man is already committed, dropping fast. Another is poised on the landing gear, ready to follow. The 160th SOAR pilot is holding the bird rock-steady, although the minimal height isn't a danger during this training run.
It's light work.
This is joint special operations at its finest — the Special Boat Service working seamlessly with the United States 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment (Airborne), the legendary Night Stalkers.
The 160th isn’t just an aviation unit.
They are the only helicopter regiment in the U.S. Army built from the ground up to support special operations. Modified Black Hawks, Chinooks, and these tiny, lethal Little Birds — flown at heights where the occupants can lick the tops of the buildings, in total darkness, often with NVGs and zero external lights.
The SBS, for their part, are the UK’s premier maritime special forces — masters of ship boarding, underwater ops, counter-terrorism, and long-range desert and arctic reconnaissance and generally just being essence as most of them are Royal Marines before they get badged.
When they need to appear out of nowhere, hit hard, and vanish again, they have historically turned to the Night Stalkers.
Partnerships like this are forged over years of joint training, shared deployments in Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, and elsewhere, and the quiet understanding that when lives are on the line, you want the best pilots in the world flying the best-modified helicopter in the world.
The 160th has inserted and extracted UK special forces on some of the most sensitive and dangerous missions of the last two decades.
The trust is absolute.
British operators trusting American pilots with their lives, and American pilots trusting British operators to do exactly what needs doing once they hit the ground.
This phot is like a NAAFI run compared to the real thing, but you get the gist of how they work together.
Today is also the 15th anniversary of the death of Orlando Rogers, who died when the small plane he was travelling in crashed.
When Orlando passed out, he was the youngest Royal Marines Officer for five years, aged just 19. He served for six years before leaving and setting up a maritime security company.
Gone but not forgotten Royal. See you at the reorg.
15 years ago today, on 15 May 2011, we lost Marine Nigel Mead of 42 Commando.
On the morning of 15 May, Lima Company was conducting a cordon and search operation. Lima Coy landed in a helicopter and began to move to the compounds of interest. Shortly after, Nigel was fatally injured in an IED blast.
Gone but not forgotten Royal. See you at the reorg.
17 years ago today, we lost Marine Jason Mackie in Afghanistan.
Jason was killed instantly when his vehicle hit an IED.
Gone but not forgotten Royal. See you at the reorg.
Royal Marine Commandos with Alpha Company 40 Commando become shrouded in a dust cloud thrown up by helicopters taking off after inserting the force. A Coy were carrying out an helicopter assault operation North of HMS (MOB) Price, Nahr-e Saraj district, Helmand Province, in January 2013.
A Coy are one of 6 Companies within the Taunton-based 40 Commando, along with Bravo, Charlie, Delta, its Command Company and a Logistic Company.
40 Commando was the last regular Royal Marines element to deploy to Afghanistan. The unit returned home in April 2013, having completed Op Herrick 17.
The best in the world!
I used to love reading the stories about us in the papers before I'd joined, and during training.
Morale in the bag to keep pushing.
K Coy of 42 Commando Royal Marines deployed to Nahre-e Saraj South, Afghanistan in April 2011 and were working independently to 42 Commando who were based in Nadi-e Ali North.
