Westland Lynx
Super Lynx and AW159 Wildcat

Britain’s agile twin-engined helicopter: still the holder of the absolute helicopter speed record, it fired the first Sea Skuas in the Falklands, crippled Iraq’s navy in 1991 and lives on as the AW159 Wildcat.

1971First flight

c. 450Lynx and Super Lynx built

400.87 km/hHelicopter speed record, 1986

62Wildcats for the British forces

Photo: Andrew Thomas from Shrewsbury, UK / CC BY-SA 2.0 via Wikimedia Commons

RoleMulti-role battlefield and naval helicopterEra1970s to presentEngine2 × Rolls-Royce Gem turboshafts; LHTEC CTS800-4N on Super Lynx 300 and WildcatOriginUnited Kingdom · Westland Helicopters, AgustaWestland, Leonardo (with Aérospatiale in the 1967 agreement)StatusIn serviceWant to fly a real military jet?

The Story

The Lynx: how Westland built the fastest helicopter in the world

In the mid-1960s Westland began designing the WG.13, a twin-engined replacement for its Scout and Wasp and a more advanced alternative to the American Huey. Under the Anglo-French helicopter agreement of February 1967, Sud Aviation took 30 per cent of the work, and Britain agreed to buy the French Puma and Gazelle while France would buy the Lynx. The French Army dropped its armed version in 1969, but the French Navy stayed in. The first prototype flew on 21 March 1971, and the next year Westland’s deputy chief test pilot Roy Moxam set speed records over 15 and 25 km at 321.74 km/h. It had a rigid titanium monobloc rotor head of the kind pioneered by the Bo 105, composite honeycomb blades and, uniquely for its class, the ability to loop and roll.

The British Army ordered more than 100 Lynx AH.1s, delivered from 1977 for transport, escort, reconnaissance and anti-tank work with eight TOW missiles. The naval HAS.2 added wheels, folding blades, a deck-lock harpoon, radar and torpedoes or Sea Skua missiles, and it went to war almost at once, in the Falklands in 1982 and the Gulf in 1991, where Royal Navy Lynx devastated Iraq’s small navy. Exports reached navies from Brazil, the first foreign customer in 1978, to Germany, the Netherlands, Denmark, Norway, Portugal, South Korea, Malaysia, Thailand, Oman and Algeria. In 1986 a modified company demonstrator, G-LYNX, set an absolute helicopter speed record of 400.87 km/h that still stands.

The type kept evolving. BERP rotor blades, a larger tail rotor and Gem 42 engines produced the Super Lynx and the Royal Navy’s HMA.8; the wheeled Battlefield Lynx became the Army’s AH.9, and the AH.9A, re-engined with CTS800s, transformed hot-weather flying in Afghanistan. Finally, the AW159 Wildcat, first flown on 12 November 2009, kept the Lynx shape but used 95 per cent new components. The Royal Navy retired its last Lynx in March 2017 and the Army in 2018, after Lynx crews had flown in the Falklands, Northern Ireland, the Gulf, the Balkans, Sierra Leone, Iraq and Afghanistan. Super Lynxes remain at sea with several navies, and 62 Wildcats now serve the British Army and Royal Navy.

Small enough for a frigate’s deck, nimble enough to loop, and faster than any other conventional helicopter ever flown.The record holder — 400.87 km/h on 11 August 1986

01The Lynx at sea: Sea Skua in the Falklands and at Bubiyan

The Royal Navy’s Lynx HAS.2s went south in 1982 with the Falklands task force, flying anti-submarine patrols alongside Sea Kings. On 3 May a Lynx made the first combat firing of the Sea Skua anti-ship missile, still not fully qualified for service, against the Argentine patrol boat ARA Alférez Sobral, causing heavy damage. No Lynx was shot down, but several were lost aboard ships hit by Argentine air attacks, among them HMS Coventry, HMS Ardent and the Atlantic Conveyor.

The Lynx’s finest hour as a ship-killer came in the 1991 Gulf War. Lynx from the destroyers and frigates HMS Cardiff, Gloucester, Manchester and Brazen hunted Iraqi naval vessels in the northern Gulf, culminating in the Battle of Bubiyan, the largest naval engagement of the war. By 2 February 1991, 25 Sea Skuas had been launched and 18 confirmed as hits; Navy Lookout credits Royal Navy Lynx with destroying 14 Iraqi vessels in 21 engagements. HMS Cardiff’s Lynx carried five ship silhouettes on its nose afterwards. Special Gulf-modified aircraft, the HAS.3GM, carried extra infrared countermeasures, jammers and FLIR.

02The Lynx on land: TOW in the desert, losses in Ireland, Iraq and Afghanistan

In the 1991 Gulf War the Army Air Corps deployed 24 TOW-armed Lynx alongside Gazelles to find and attack Iraqi armour. On 26 February a Lynx of 654 Squadron destroyed four T-55 tanks and two MT-LB armoured carriers, the first recorded combat use of TOW from a British helicopter. Army Lynx later escorted the Chinooks carrying troops into Kosovo in 1999 and helped rescue British soldiers in Sierra Leone during Operation Barras in 2000.

The losses tell the harder story. On 19 March 1994 the IRA brought down Lynx AH.7 ZD275 with an improvised mortar as it landed at Crossmaglen; the crew survived. On 6 May 2006 a Lynx AH.7 of the Commando Helicopter Force was shot down by a shoulder-launched missile over Basra, killing five, among them 847 Naval Air Squadron’s commanding officer, Lieutenant Commander Darren Chapman, Wing Commander Coxen and Flight Lieutenant Sarah-Jayne Mulvihill, the first British servicewoman killed in action in 22 years. In Afghanistan the AH.7 could fly only in winter until the AH.9A arrived in 2010; on 26 April 2014 an AH.9A crashed near Kandahar, killing all five aboard.

Design & Engineering

What makes the Lynx special

A rigid rotor and BERP blades

The Lynx’s four-bladed main rotor sits on a rigid titanium monobloc head with no flapping hinges, giving fast, precise control response and making the helicopter fully aerobatic: it can loop and roll, which is why the Army’s Blue Eagles and the Navy’s Black Cats display teams flew it. Later Lynx adopted BERP blades from the British Experimental Rotor Programme, with distinctive paddle-shaped tips that delay blade stall and raise top speed; on the record-breaking G-LYNX the blade tips approached Mach 0.97.

Built for a frigate’s deck

Naval Lynx traded skids for a fixed tricycle undercarriage, folding main blades and tail, emergency flotation and a harpoon deck-lock that engages a grid on the flight deck. The rotor can generate negative lift to hold the aircraft down on a heaving deck. That combination let a 5-tonne helicopter operate from small frigates in heavy weather, and it carried radar, dipping sonar or magnetic anomaly detectors, Sting Ray torpedoes, depth charges and Sea Skua missiles.

One airframe, many jobs

Behind a side-by-side cockpit for pilot and observer, the cabin takes up to about ten troops depending on seating, or stretchers, radios for a command post, or extra fuel. Army Lynx carried TOW missiles on outriggers or door-mounted machine guns, and could switch roles quickly; AgustaWestland claimed a conversion in about 40 minutes. More than 40 variants served with British and export forces, from Danish fishery patrols around Greenland to South Korean anti-submarine patrols.

03The Lynx’s successor: the AW159 Wildcat

In 2002 the Ministry of Defence began studies for a Future Lynx, and in June 2006 AgustaWestland won a £1 billion contract for 70, later cut to 62: 34 for the Army and 28 for the Royal Navy. Named Wildcat in April 2009, it first flew from Yeovil on 12 November 2009. Although it looks like a Lynx, it has 95 per cent new components, a machined airframe by GKN with a far lower part count, two LHTEC CTS800-4N engines, BERP IV blades, a new tail rotor and nose, and a glass cockpit with four large displays. The naval HMA2 has a Seaspray 7400E AESA radar and a Wescam MX-15 sensor turret.

The Army’s Wildcat AH1 reached initial operating capability in August 2014 and the Navy’s HMA2 in January 2015, first deploying in HMS Lancaster in March 2015. Its weapons include the Martlet lightweight missile against small boats and uncrewed surface craft, up to 20 per aircraft, and the Sea Venom anti-ship missile, which replaced Sea Skua and reached initial operating capability in 2025. South Korea bought eight and the Philippines two, with more ordered. On 4 July 2019 Royal Marines of 42 Commando fast-roped from a Wildcat onto the tanker Grace 1 off Gibraltar. Britain’s 2026 defence investment plan foresees replacing the Wildcat with uncrewed systems in the 2030s.

Technical Data

Westland Super Lynx (Series 100) specifications

Specifications

Crew: 2–3 (pilot, observer and crewman or door gunner)
Capacity: 8 troops; 1,361 kg (3,000 lb) underslung
Length: 13.34 m (43 ft 9 in) fuselage including tail rotor; 15.24 m (50 ft) rotors turning
Main rotor diameter: 12.80 m (42 ft)
Height: 3.67 m (12 ft 0.5 in)
Empty weight: 3,277 kg (7,225 lb)
Max take-off weight: 5,330 kg (11,750 lb)
Powerplant: 2 × LHTEC CTS800-4N turboshafts, 1,016 kW (1,362 shp) each, or 2 × Rolls-Royce Gem 42-1, 746 kW (1,000 shp) each
Maximum speed: 324 km/h (201 mph; 175 kn)
Range: 528 km (328 mi; 285 nmi)
Endurance: 5 hours 20 minutes with auxiliary fuel
Armament: 2 × torpedoes or depth charges, or 4 × Sea Skua; Army versions 8 × TOW, 20 mm cannon, rocket pods or door-mounted machine guns

Costs & production

Unit cost: Wildcat programme: £1.689 billion forecast for 62 aircraft including development (DE&S); lifetime programme cost forecast at £5.2 billion (2016)
Cost per flight hour: No official figure published for Lynx or Wildcat. Hedged estimate: several thousand pounds per hour, based on a 5–6 tonne twin-turbine naval helicopter whose costs are dominated by maintenance of marinised airframes, engines and mission systems
Production: About 450 Lynx and Super Lynx built; 62 Wildcats for the UK plus exports to South Korea and the Philippines
Programme: WG.13 design mid-1960s; first flight 21 March 1971; Army service 1977–2018; Royal Navy service until 2017; Wildcat first flight 2009

04The Lynx’s variants: from WG.13 to Super Lynx 300

WG.13: prototypes; 13 built, first flight 21 March 1971.
Lynx AH.1: first Army version, 113 built from 1977; 60 fitted for TOW.
Lynx AH.7: uprated Army version with a larger composite tail rotor; later BERP blades.
Lynx AH.9 (Battlefield Lynx): wheeled utility version; AH.9A re-engined with CTS800-4N, all 22 upgraded by December 2011.
Lynx HAS.2 / Mk.2(FN): first naval versions for the Royal Navy (60) and French Navy (26).
Lynx HAS.3: Gem 42 engines and upgraded gearbox; Gulf-modified HAS.3GM and Antarctic HAS.3ICE.
Lynx HMA.8: Royal Navy Super Lynx with nose FLIR and under-nose radar.
Export Lynx: Brazil (Mk.21), Netherlands (UH-14A, SH-14B/C/D), Denmark (Mk.80/90), Norway (Mk.86), Germany (Mk.88), Nigeria, Qatar, Argentina and others.
Super Lynx: Portugal (Mk.95), South Korea (Mk.99), Malaysia (Mk.100), Thailand (Mk.110), Oman (Mk.120), Algeria (Mk.130), Germany (Mk.88A).
Super Lynx 300: CTS800-4N engines and a glass cockpit derived from the EH101.
Westland 30: enlarged civil derivative for up to 22 passengers.
AW159 Wildcat: Wildcat AH1 (Army, 34) and HMA2 (Navy, 28); exports to South Korea and the Philippines.

05The Lynx’s operating costs: upgrades instead of replacements

The Lynx’s economics have been shaped by mid-life upgrades. The Army’s AH.9A programme was run as an urgent operational requirement: the first re-engined aircraft reached Afghanistan in May 2010, 18 months after the project began, and the last of 22 was handed over three months early in December 2011. Portugal, Brazil and South Korea have taken similar routes, Portugal’s Mk95A gaining CTS800 engines and a Wildcat-derived glass cockpit to serve into the 2030s.

For Britain, the bigger decision was to buy the Wildcat rather than more Merlins or a foreign type, sustaining Westland’s Yeovil factory. The Wildcat came with a 34-year integrated support and training arrangement. No operator publishes a reliable cost per flight hour for either type, so the figure in the table is an estimate based on the class, not an official number.

Timeline

The Lynx from WG.13 to Wildcat

1967

Anglo-French deal

Sud Aviation takes 30 per cent of the WG.13 under the helicopter agreement signed in February.

1971

First flight

The first Lynx prototype flies on 21 March.

1972

Speed records

Roy Moxam sets records over 15 and 25 km at 321.74 km/h.

1977

Army deliveries

Production Lynx AH.1s reach the British Army; the AAC puts them into service in 1979.

1982

Falklands

On 3 May a Lynx makes the first combat firing of Sea Skua, against ARA Alférez Sobral.

1986

400.87 km/h

Trevor Egginton flies G-LYNX to the absolute helicopter speed record on 11 August.

1991

Gulf War

Navy Lynx dominate the Battle of Bubiyan; Army Lynx fire TOW in combat for the first time.

2006

Basra

A Lynx AH.7 is shot down over Basra on 6 May, killing five.

2009

Wildcat flies

The AW159 Wildcat makes its first flight at Yeovil on 12 November.

2014

Wildcat in service

The Army’s Wildcat AH1 enters service on 29 August; Norway retires its Lynx in December.

2017

Royal Navy farewell

Overnight on 4 July 2019 Royal Marines of 42 Commando seized the supertanker Grace 1 off Gibraltar, suspected of carrying Iranian oil to Syria in breach of EU sanctions. Some landed on the deck by fast-roping from a Wildcat helicopter while others followed by speedboat. The operation, and Iran’s furious response, put the Lynx’s successor into the headlines; the Royal Navy’s Wildcats now also escort carrier groups, armed against small boats with Martlet missiles.

Gallery

The Lynx in pictures

Operations

Where the Lynx flies and flew

Service Record

The Lynx’s record

The Lynx went to war in the Falklands, the Gulf, Northern Ireland, the Balkans, Sierra Leone, Iraq and Afghanistan, and pioneered helicopter-launched anti-ship missiles in combat. Losses came mostly from accidents and ground fire, including the Basra shoot-down of 2006.

14Iraqi vessels credited to Royal Navy Lynx with Sea Skua, 1991

6Armoured vehicles destroyed by one Army Lynx with TOW, 26 February 1991

24Royal Navy Lynx deployed to the Falklands, 1982

See how training and combat types compare in the military aircraft statistics database. Figures are approximate.

Questions & Answers

Everything people ask about the Lynx

Can I fly in a Westland Lynx?

MiGFlug does not offer flights in the Lynx, but you can fly several genuine military jets today, from the L-39 Albatros to the MiG-21, see MiGFlug’s jet flights.

Is the Lynx the fastest helicopter in the world?

It holds the FAI absolute speed record for conventional helicopters: 400.87 km/h, set by G-LYNX on 11 August 1986. Compound and experimental rotorcraft have flown faster but sit in other categories.

Can a Lynx loop?

Yes. Its rigid rotor head makes it fully aerobatic, and display teams such as the Blue Eagles and Black Cats flew loops and rolls in it.

What is the difference between the Lynx and the Wildcat?

The AW159 Wildcat is a development of the Super Lynx with 95 per cent new components, CTS800 engines, BERP IV blades, a glass cockpit, AESA radar and new weapons such as Martlet and Sea Venom.

When did Britain retire the Lynx?

The Royal Navy decommissioned its Lynx on 23 March 2017 and the Army Air Corps retired the type in 2018.

Who still flies the Lynx?

Super Lynx and Lynx remain with navies including Brazil, Portugal, South Korea, Malaysia, Thailand, Oman, Algeria and South Africa; Germany plans to retire its Sea Lynx by the end of 2026.

Where can I see a Lynx?

G-LYNX is at The Helicopter Museum, Weston-super-Mare; others are at IWM Duxford, the Fleet Air Arm Museum, the National Army Museum in London, the Norwegian Aviation Museum in Bodø and the Pima Air & Space Museum in Arizona.

The part of the museum you can fly