Vampire and Venom jets bow out

After serving the Royal Australian Navy Fleet Air Arm faithfully since the mid 1950s the Sea Venom and Vampire jets have been phased out of service. In recent years the Venoms and Vampires have been used as training aircraft with 724 Squadron at the Naval Air Station at Nowra, but they have now been replaced by Macchi jet trainers. The RAN will buy a total of 10 Macchis, an Italian built aircraft built under licence in Australia and capable of cruising speeds of up to 500mph. The Macchis with support equipment will cost a total of 7.6 million dollars. There were moments of nostalgia at Nowra for many pilots when the Station Executive Officer, Commander N E Lee made the last flight in a Vampire to mark the phasing out of the Vampires and Venoms. Commander Lee first flew a Vampire in 1954. On the last flight he had an escort of a flight of Skyhawk fighter bombers, the Navy's front line jets.