22 May: Calm after the storm

Bad weather over the coast of Argentina on Saturday 22 May 1982 brought some relief to the ships of the British task force in Falkland Sound and San Carlos Water.

 

But there was still plenty to be done to secure the foothold that had been won in the heat of battle the previous day – a distinct element of Operation Corporate (the retaking of the Falklands) known as Operation Sutton, which had been achieved with no fatalities at all amongst the assault troops.

 

The two big assault ships, HMS Fearless and HMS Intrepid, five Landing Ships Logistic and two auxiliaries – the 23,000-tonne RFA Fort Austin and RFA Stromness – remained in the vicinity of San Carlos Water.

 

Only four of the original seven escort ships remained – HMS Argonaut, HMS Brilliant, HMS Plymouth and HMS Yarmouth, though Argonaut’s damage meant she was of limited use.

 

HMS Broadsword had sailed to join HMS Coventry off Pebble Island to the north-west to catch incoming Argentine aircraft early, and the damaged HMS Antrim had rejoined the carrier group out to the east.

 

Type 21 frigate HMS Ardent, devastated by bombs the previous day and which had been abandoned as fires and flooding raged out of control, sank on the evening of 22 May, by which time a replacement, sister ship HMS Antelope, had already arrived in Falkland Sound.

 

Also arriving on that day were Type 42 destroyer HMS Exeter, Type 21 frigate HMS Ambuscade, and patrol ship/dispatch vessel HMS Leeds Castle, later to become a familiar sight around the Falklands when she and sister ship HMS Dumbarton Castle shared the duties of Falkland Islands Guard Ship.

 

Patrols by Sea Harriers from carriers HMS Hermes and HMS Invincible continued throughout 22 May – 60 combat air patrols were flown on 22 May, ten more than the previous day – and they had an early success in Choiseul Sound when a pair of jets from 800 Naval Air Squadron spotted Argentine Coast Guard patrol boat PNA Rio Iguaza and strafed the 65-ton vessel, which had been carrying artillery guns and aircraft spares from Stanley to Goose Green.

 

The patrol craft ran ashore, but her cargo was largely salvaged.

 

The British beachhead was defended on all four sides ­– 3 Para were to the north of Port San Carlos,  40 and 42 Cdo RM to the east, 2 Para to the south and 45 Cdo RM to the west, above Ajax Bay.

 

One significant event on 22 May was the establishment of the field hospital (or ‘Advanced Surgical Centre’) in part of an abandoned mutton-processing factory at Ajax Bay.

 

Under the leadership of the Officer Commanding Medical Squadron of the Commando Logistics Regiment, Surg Cdr Rick Jolly, the field hospital – set up in the refrigeration plant area as that was just about the only part that still had a serviceable roof – went on to treat hundreds of British and Argentine wounded, of whom only three died as a consequence of their injuries.

 

The hospital became known as the Red and Green Life Machine – named for the red and green berets of the Army and Royal Marines medics who manned it – and was usually the first stop on a journey which saw patients stabilised, transferred out to the more sterile conditions on board hospital ship HMHS Uganda, then possibly taken by ambulance ship (survey vessels HMS Hecla, HMS Herald and HMS Hydra, specially converted for the role) to Uruguay for onward transport by air to the UK.

 

Elsewhere, after a two-week passage from Ascension Island, tanker RFA Brambleleaf arrived in Portland to have her tanks cleaned out and repair work undertaken. She sailed again for the South Atlantic via Gibraltar just over a week later.

 

Today’s image from the Imperial War Museum collection (© IWM FKD 93) shows the disused refrigeration plant of an abandoned mutton-processing factory close to the beaches where troops came ashore in Ajax Bay, which become operational as the British field hospital on 22 May.

 

* These posts can only give a brief sense of what was a complex and fast-moving situation 40 years ago, and cannot cover the involvement of every ship, squadron and unit in detail – for a much more comprehensive account see the Falklands section of naval-history.net at https://www.naval-history.net/NAVAL1982FALKLANDS.htm

 

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May 22 Ajax Bay