- ICAO Code: X6TW
- Location: Orkney, Scotland, United Kingdom
- Type: Flying Off Station
- Parent: Royal Navy Fleet Air Arm
- Current Version: 1.0
- Download link: Download
- Required Libraries, IPDC WW2 RAF Vehicle Library, IPDC Objects Library
Known to the Royal Navy as HMS Tern, even though it’s not a “Ship”, the Royal Naval Air Station at Twatt in Orkney was a ‘flying off’ station, used to house Squadrons of aircraft that would normally be stationed on ships, while their carriers were in the nearby Naval Base at Scapa Flow.
It was also named by someone with a six year-old’s sense of humour, as the nearest village is actually Isbister, not Twatt, but let’s set that aside for a moment.
Opened in 1941, with accommodation for approximately fifty aircraft, the airfield had no fewer than 29 hangars; 28 were “Mainhill” types of two different sizes, dispersed around the site and mainly protected by grass berms, while the 29th was a single Aircraft Repair Workshop type (represented in this scenery by a B.1 steel shed). The standard FAA four-runway layout of approximately 1000yds each was created by the constructors from Royal Marines Engineering and the most Northerly part of the site was taken up by a personnel accommodation area known as Skogar Camp.
From descriptions of the location at the time, it seems that being stationed at HMS Tern, no matter how temporarily, was not popular with either aircrew or ground staff, given that the place is nowhere near anywhere and very exposed to anything and everything that the North Atlantic Ocean could throw at it. The same descriptions can be heard from Royal Air Force crews and guests, stationed at the (very nearby to the South) RAF Skeabrae, who were tasked with the aerial defence of Scapa Flow and its surroundings.
While a large number of Squadrons, operating pretty much all types operated by the Fleet Air Arm, were temporarily at the Station, there were also ‘Permanent’ attachments including 700 Squadron, training catapult aircraft crew, and 771 Squadron who, as a Fleet Requirements Unit (FRU), operated all sorts of types and roles in support of the Fleet at Scapa Flow.
Late in the war, when the air raid threat was diminished, RNAS Twatt actually became a parent station for a while, when RAF Skeabrae was attached as “HMS Tern II”, and both survived the war, being paid off into “Care and Maintenance” under control of Lossiemouth in 1946 but remaining usable as relief landing grounds, before finally being closed in 1957. Late in its operational life, 1945 even saw Twatt operate helicopters, with a number of Sikorsky R-4s (known to the British forces as “Hoverfly”) paying visits to the Station.
Today, the wartime layout of RNAS Twatt is very visible from the air and a number of the buildings also still remain – this includes the unique Watch Office and Operations Block building, which is under the care of the Birsay Heritage Trust, who hope to “Tern” (sorry!) it into a visitor centre. While RAF Skeabrae is not included in this scenery file, its remnants can also be seen from the air, but are less well defined and fewer structures have survived.
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