The Lost Argentine Lynx: a misinformed post
The Lost Argentine Lynx: a misinformed post.
In attempt to inform about the daily actions during the Falklands conflict, Phillips incurred in a mistake, asseverating that an Argentine Lynx naval helicopter was lost on May 2nd, and her crew was lost:
However, there's a conflicting account in this article by Retired Argentine Navy Captain Miguel Fajre, who was a Lieutenant pilot of Sea Lynx in 1982:
"On May 15, I was on board the Santísima Trinidad with 3-H-141 when, at 11 in the morning, an operational flight was ordered for the Hercules helicopter 3-H-142. A while later, while carrying out the ordered flight, the Sea Lynx has a failure in one of its turbines that causes an accident and leads it to crash into the sea. Her three crew members, Corvette Captain Perciacanto, Corvette Lieutenant Loubet and Petty Officer Second González were rescued alive.In fact, the wrecked 3-H-142 was later recovered, and it's preserved at Navy Museum (MUAN) in Bahia Blanca, these pictures were published in Histarmar and Jetphotos websites. It is also listed en the Helis database as "Recovered but not repair - hull last seen at Navy Museum (MUAN) in Bahia Blanca".
As of that fact, only the Hercules helicopter remained operational, which continued with the ordered flights until on May 22, on a night operational flight from the Espora Base to the Destroyer Hercules, it had a problem in one of its turbines, and forced us to to return to Base.
With the return of the only Sea Lynx available to its seat base and the obvious impossibility of obtaining spare parts for its commissioning, this brief but intense chapter of the performance of the only two “Linces del Mar” closes, which would be the translation of Sea Lynx, in the recovery of our Falkland Islands."
The remaining Lynx, 3-H-141, was sold to the Danish Navy in 1987, renumbered as S-035. Two of the other eight Lynx ordered by the Argentine Navy, 3-H-143 and 3-H-144, were impounded before their delivery to Argentina and also sold to Denmark.