RNAS Culdrose
Royal Naval Air Station Culdrose is a Royal Navy airbase near Helston on the Lizard Peninsula of Cornwall. It currently has three major roles: serving the Fleet Air Arm's front line Sea King and Merlin helicopter squadrons; providing search and rescue for the South West region; and training divers for the Royal Navy.HistoryAdmiralty surveyors first started preliminary surveys of land near Helston in 1942. RNAS Culdrose was commissioned as HMS Seahawk five years after these initial surveys. The station was originally designed to be a wartime airfield lasting about ten years.The initial plans were for Culdrose to serve as a Naval Fighting School, it soon developed other roles. These varied roles included such things as the trials of the Navy's first jets, training of airbone early warning crews and as a home base for carrier based aircraft. Over the years the stations emphasis changed from fixed wing aircraft to rotary wing, although its main role remains largely the same.On 18 May 2012, British Airways flight BAW2012 carrying the Olympic Flame, from Athens International Airport, landed at RNAS Culdrose. The aircraft, an Airbus G-EUPC and known as 'The Firefly', carried dignitaries including Seb Coe, Princess Anne, and David Beckham. The following day the Olympic Flame started its first leg from Land's End, through Cornwall, to Plymouth. Its final destination was the Olympic Stadium in time for the start of the 2012 Summer Olympics.
