Air Marshal Iain Walter McNicoll, (born 3 May 1953) is a retired

Royal Air Force The Royal Air Force (RAF) is the United Kingdom's air and space force. It was formed towards the end of the First World War on 1 April 1918, becoming the first independent air force in the world, by regrouping the Royal Flying Corps (RFC) and ...

officer. He was formerly Deputy Commander-in-Chief Operations,

RAF Air Command Air Command is the only Command currently active in the Royal Air Force. It was formed by the merger of Royal Air Force Strike and Personnel and Training commands on 1 April 2007, and has its headquarters at RAF High Wycombe, Buckinghamshire. ...

RAF career

Educated at the

High School of Dundee The High School of Dundee is an independent, co-educational, day school in Dundee, Scotland, which provides nursery, primary and secondary education to just over one thousand pupils. Its foundation has been dated to 1239, and it is the only priv ...

and the

University of Edinburgh The University of Edinburgh ( sco, University o Edinburgh, gd, Oilthigh Dhùn Èideann; abbreviated as ''Edin.'' in post-nominals) is a public research university based in Edinburgh, Scotland. Granted a royal charter by King James VI in 15 ...

, where he gained a

Bachelor of Science A Bachelor of Science (BS, BSc, SB, or ScB; from the Latin ') is a bachelor's degree awarded for programs that generally last three to five years. The first university to admit a student to the degree of Bachelor of Science was the University of ...

, and having been in the East Lowlands Universities Air Squadron McNicoll joined the

Flying Branch in 1975.Air Marshal I W McNicoll CB CBE BSc FRAeS RAF Deputy Commander-in-Chief Operations
RAF He was appointed Officer Commanding No. 17(F) Squadron in 1992 and assistant director of Operational Capability at the

Ministry of Defence {{unsourced, date=February 2021 A ministry of defence or defense (see spelling differences), also known as a department of defence or defense, is an often-used name for the part of a government responsible for matters of defence, found in states ...

in 1996. He went on to be Personal Staff Officer to the Chief of the Defence Staff in 1997 and Station Commander

RAF Brüggen Royal Air Force Brüggen, more commonly known as RAF Brüggen, in Germany was a major station of the Royal Air Force until 15 June 2001. It was situated next to the village of Elmpt, approximately west of Düsseldorf on the Dutch-German bo ...

in 1998 in which role had operational control of the base's

Tornado A tornado is a violently rotating column of air that is in contact with both the surface of the Earth and a cumulonimbus cloud or, in rare cases, the base of a cumulus cloud. It is often referred to as a twister, whirlwind or cyclone, altho ...

aircraft during

1999 NATO bombing of Yugoslavia The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) carried out an aerial bombing campaign against the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia during the Kosovo War. The air strikes lasted from 24 March 1999 to 10 June 1999. The bombings continued until an a ...

. He became Director of Force Development in 2000, Director-General of Joint Doctrine and Concepts in 2002 and Air Officer Commanding

No. 2 Group No. 2 Group is a Group (military aviation unit)#United Kingdom, group of the Royal Air Force which was first activated in 1918, served from 1918–20, from 1936 through the Second World War to 1947, from 1948 to 1958, from 1993 to 1996, was react ...

in 2005. His last appointment was as Deputy Commander-in-Chief (Operations) at Air Command in 2007, in which role he had to defend the

airworthiness In aviation, airworthiness is the measure of an aircraft's suitability for safe flight. Initial airworthiness is demonstrated by a certificate of airworthiness issued by the civil aviation authority in the state in which the aircraft is register ...

of his ageing aircraft,RAF transport fleet 'out of date'
BBC News, 24 November 2006 before he retired in April 2010.

Personal life

He married Wendelien van den Biggelaar, a Dutch citizen, in 1980: they have one son and two daughters.

Reference list

, - , - , - , - {{DEFAULTSORT:McNicoll, Iain 1953 births Alumni of the University of Edinburgh Commanders of the Order of the British Empire Companions of the Order of the Bath Fellows of the Royal Aeronautical Society Living people People educated at the High School of Dundee Recipients of the Commendation for Valuable Service in the Air Royal Air Force air marshals