The Danish Navy Air Squadron ( da, Søværnets Helikoptertjeneste), was the aerial component of the

Danish navy The Royal Danish Navy ( da, Søværnet) is the sea-based branch of the Danish Defence force. The RDN is mainly responsible for maritime defence and maintaining the sovereignty of Danish territorial waters (incl. Faroe Islands and Greenland). Oth ...

, from 1977 to December 31, 2010. Operationally it was directly under command of the

Danish Naval Command The Admiral Danish Fleet (ADMDANFLT) ( da, Søværnets Operative Kommando ) was the operationally supreme organisation of the Royal Danish Navy The Royal Danish Navy ( da, Søværnet) is the sea-based branch of the Danish Defence force. The RD ...

, but maintenance of the eight

Westland Lynx The Westland Lynx is a British multi-purpose twin-engined military helicopter designed and built by Westland Helicopters at its factory in Yeovil. Originally intended as a utility craft for both civil and naval usage, military interest led t ...

helicopters and training of personnel was in cooperation with the

air force An air force – in the broadest sense – is the national military branch that primarily conducts aerial warfare. More specifically, it is the branch of a nation's armed services that is responsible for aerial warfare as distinct from an a ...

. The

helicopter A helicopter is a type of rotorcraft in which lift and thrust are supplied by horizontally spinning rotors. This allows the helicopter to take off and land vertically, to hover, and to fly forward, backward and laterally. These attributes ...

s were used primarily for fishery patrol, shipboard support and coastal Search & Rescue (SAR) missions. The tasks and hardware have now been transferred to the air force as Eskadrille 723 (''Squadron 723'').

History

The squadron was originally a

flight Flight or flying is the process by which an object moves through a space without contacting any planetary surface, either within an atmosphere (i.e. air flight or aviation) or through the vacuum of outer space (i.e. spaceflight). This can be a ...

in the air force '' eskadrille 722'' (722nd Squadron) when the first

Alouette III Alouette or alouettes may refer to: Music and literature * "Alouette" (song), a French-language children's song * Alouette, a character in ''The King of Braves GaoGaiGar'' Aerospace * SNCASE Alouette, a utility helicopter developed in France i ...

helicopter was received in 1962. In 1977 the flight was made into a unit of its own and became a part of the navy, under the name ''Søværnets Flyvetjeneste'' (''The Naval Air Service''). In 1980-1982 the eight Alouette helicopters were replaced with the new Westland Lynx helicopters. In 2000 it was decided that ''Søværnets Flyvetjeneste'' should be transferred to the air force as a squadron (''728th Squadron'') and put under operational command of the air force command along with the Army Air Corps (''Hærens Flyvetjeneste''), but for a political reasonVindposen, dec. 2003 s. 8
only the army units were transferred to the air force (as '' 724th Squadron''). At the same time, all the Danish helicopter units were also to move physically from ''Værløse Air Station'' and ''Vandel Air Station'' to ''Karup Air Station''. The total number of helicopters in the air force would have been 8 Sikorsky S-61A, 13 Eurocopter AS550C2 Fennec, 16 Hughes H-500C Cayuse and 8 Westland Lynx Mk.90B as well as 14 AgustaWestland EH-101 Merlin under purchase - a grand total of 59 helicopters. International obligations didn't allow for the Danish air force to possess so many helicopters. Because of that the Naval Air Service was transformed into the Naval Air Squadron on 1 January 2004. A Danish navy helicopter foiled a pirate attack off Somali coast, 28 August 2010.

Historical equipment

Organisation

Order of Battle on 31 December 2010, the day it was disbanded:

Bases

Vaerlose (ICAO code: EKVL) Vaerlose is located northwest of

Copenhagen Copenhagen ( or .; da, København ) is the capital and most populous city of Denmark, with a proper population of around 815.000 in the last quarter of 2022; and some 1.370,000 in the urban area; and the wider Copenhagen metropolitan ar ...

, only about 20 km from the city centre. It was originally constructed as an army camp in 1910 and rebuild as a military airfield in the 1930s. After WW2 RDAF operations were resumed, principally with transport aircraft. It became the main base of the Naval Air Service in 1962. On 1 April 2004 the airfield was closed as a military base, due to military budget cuts, and handed over to civilian use in October 2008. Runway data: Location: N55° 46' 3" E012° 20' 36", Elev: 58 ft (18 m), Rwy 28/10, Size: 8061 x 150 ft (2457 x 46 m).

Karup Karup is a town in Viborg Municipality, Denmark ) , song = ( en, "King Christian stood by the lofty mast") , song_type = National and royal anthem , image_map = EU-Denmark.svg , map_caption = , subdivision_type = Sovereign state , su ...

(ICAO: EKKA) Karup is located between

Herning Herning () is a Danish town in the Central Denmark Region of the Jutland peninsula. It is the main town and the administrative seat of Herning Municipality. Herning has a population of 50,565 (1 January 2022)Viborg in central Denmark. It is a dual civil-military airport. It was originally built by the Germans in WW2 as ''Fliegerhorst Grove'', and taken over by the

RDAF The Royal Danish Air Force ( da, Flyvevåbnet, lit=The Flying weapon) (RDAF) is the aerial warfare force of The Kingdom of Denmark and one of the four branches of the Danish Defence. Initially being components of the Army and the Navy, it was ...

post war. Since 2004 it has been the main helicopter base for the

Danish Defence Danish Defence ( da, Forsvaret, fo, Danska verjan, kl, Illersuisut) is the unified armed forces of the Kingdom of Denmark charged with the defence of Denmark and its constituent, self-governing nations Greenland and the Faroe Islands. The Defe ...

. Runway data: Location: N56° 17' 50.85" E009° 07' 28.66", Elev: 170 ft (52 m), Rwy 04/22, Size: 2936 x 50 ft (895 x 15 m), Rwy 09/27, Size: 2789 x 197 ft (850 x 60 m), Rwy 09R/27L, Size: 9607 x 150 ft (2928 x 46 m), Rwy 09L/27R, Size: 9816 x 75 ft (2992 x 23 m), Rwy 14/32, Size: 2296 x 60 ft (700 x 18 m).

Future plans

The Westland Super Lynx is in the process of being replaced with a new helicopter.

Danish Defence Acquisition and Logistics Organization The Danish Defence Acquisition and Logistics Organization (DALO) ( da, Forsvarets Materiel- og Indkøbsstyrelse, FMI) is a joint service unit under the Ministry of Defence, tasked with purchase, service and support of equipment within the Danish ...

has placed an order for the Sikorsky Seahawk MH60-R

References and external sources

Artikel om Søværnets Flyvetjeneste (2000)
{{Military of Denmark Royal Danish Navy Danish Air Force squadrons