A WARTIME connection with an Australian squadron which flew Sunderlands from Pembroke Dock has been rekindled 80 years on.

During a holiday in Australia earlier in the year, Dr Andrew Watkin, a trustee with the Pembroke Dock Heritage Centre, arranged to visit No 10 Squadron Royal Australian Air Force at RAAF Station Edinburgh, near Adelaide.

The squadron flies Lockheed AP-3C Orion maritime patrol aircraft – modern-day successors to the Sunderland – and will soon be re-equipping with the Boeing P8 Porseidon.

“I had a great reception,” recalled Andy. “The squadron is very proud of its wartime role in Pembroke Dock. Wartime members of 10 Squadron were the first RAAF airmen to arrive in Britain to support the RAF, the main party reaching ‘PD’ on Boxing Day 1939.”

A highlight of Andy’s day was ‘flying’ the Orion simulator which was “quite an experience,” he said. He was also taken on a tour of the base and the cavernous Orion hangar.

Andy presented the squadron CO, Wing Commander Colin Smith, with a print of a 10 Squadron Sunderland, by Welsh aviation artist John Wynne Hopkins, and in return received a large print of an Orion which will be framed and displayed at the Heritage Centre.