Wasp XT788

Resources

This is our very own XT788 Wasp HAS 1 on display. The Westland Wasp, the naval version of the British Army's Scout, was developed as a light anti-submarine helicopter for operations from small ships and was the first of a new generation of gas-turbine powered light helicopters. Wasps from the ice patrol ship HMS Endurance took part in the attacks which crippled the Argentine submarine Santa Fe during the Falklands War. Duxford's Wasp was part of the Falklands Task Force in 1982.

Ian Bennet has a really cool Gas Turbine site that deals with the Rolls Royce Nimbus in a great detail. if you look carefully you'll even catch a glimpse of our XT788.

Roger Marmion is a real Gas Turbine whizz and has an area of his site dedicated to the Nimbus, This guy actually gets these things running on his workbench - here's the sound of a Nimbus starting up! nimbus.wav nimbus.mp3

This is a Wasp winching off another Tribal class frigate, HMS Mohawk (you can see an M - the first letter of the ship's ID code - painted on the flight deck) in July 1972. Aircraft side numbers (aka index numbers) were unique to the mother ship. In this case 474 identifies the Wasp as belonging to Mohawk; Minerva's Wasp was 424, Arethusa's Wasp was 444 and so on. The number on XT788 when you first saw it (442) links it to a particular ship - but I don't know which one. There was no 442 Squadron! Serial numbers, on the other hand, never changed - XT788 has been XT788 throughout its life.

- Nigel Dark, pilot of XT788 aboard HMS Minerva in late 1960's.

Wasp HAS 1 G-BYCX Wroughton, Wiltshire UK, May 12, 2001. Courtesy of Colin Work via airliners.net

	These images are of Wasp 457 on HMS Nubian (sister ship to Zulu), taken by Nigel Dark from HMS Albion during a replenishment at sea in the Indian Ocean in late 1965. Nigel was flying Wessex 5s at the time but later flew Wasps (including our XT788). Click on each image to enlarge, we have even finer quality images available, please contact us if you'd like to view them.



	A Wasp firing its wire-guided missiles.

If you have any information on these aircraft or these models in general then please add it to our Wasp datalogger guestbook - we'll use it to build as complete a picture of these aircraft as possible. If you have any comments on the site in general please add an entry to our guestbook or email webmaster@xray-tango.org.uk

We've collected together a list of useful resources for research, feel free to view them here

Several Wasps (and Scouts) were shipped off for use by the Royal New Zealand Air Force and these are recorded and covered very well by Philip Treweek on his site kiwiaircraftimages.com. His coverage of the Wasp is very thorough with a substantial background, technical specs and some excellent close-up images with good commentry.

A five seat general purpose, shipborne helicopter

Rotor diameter: 9.83 m

Length: 12.29 m

Weight: 1566 kg - Max.2495

Speed : Max.211 Km/h

Power: 1 Rolls-Royce Nimbus 103 turboshaft (1050 hp)

Range: 488 Km

Acommodation: Pilot plus 4

No.Built: 98

	A schematic of the Port elevation, click to enlarge.
	Port, Front and Belly, click to enlarge.
	A drawing of XT970, click to enlarge.
	Another schematic of the Wasp.
	Rolls Royce manufactured the Nimbus, click their logo to enter the Rolls-Royce website.