page_title: 93rd Heavy Anti-Aircraft Regiment, Royal Artillery
section_title: 290 Heavy Anti-Aircraft Battery, RA
hierarchical_section_title: 93rd Heavy Anti-Aircraft Regiment, Royal Artillery / World War II / 290 Heavy Anti-Aircraft Battery, RA
caption_attribution_description: The 3.7-Inch QF AA was Britain's primary heavy anti-aircraft gun during World War II, the equivalent of the German 88 mm FlaK with a slightly larger calibre of 94 mm. It remained in use after the war until AA guns were replaced by guided missiles in the late 1950s.
context_page_description: 93rd Heavy Anti-Aircraft Regiment, Royal Artillery was a volunteer air defence unit of Britain's Territorial Army formed in Cheshire just before the outbreak of World War I. It served in the Liverpool Blitz and later in the Faroe Islands, the Middle East and North Africa. Postwar it continued in the TA until 1955.
context_section_description: During 1940 a British force had occupied the Danish Faroe Islands to prevent the Germans using them as a base for attacks on the North Atlantic convoys. The first LAA detachments arrived in July 1941 and immediately came under attack from long-range Junkers Ju 88 bombers based in Norway. The defences were built up slowly: the Royal Engineers built an airfield at Vaago (the modern Vágar Airport). On 1 July 1942, 290 HAA Bty arrived, with 3.7-inch guns. It deployed one 4-gun Troop at Vaago, and the other at the islands' capital at Thorshavn. The guns were on static mountings, for which sites had to be prepared with access roads, emplacements and hutting. These were constructed over two months by Faroese labor. The battery had two GL Mk II gun-laying radar sets and a semi-automatic plotter that gave the guns the ability to engage unseen targets in cloud or at night, there being no searchlights available. On 22 July the battery absorbed two sections of 434 HAA Bty from 70th (West Lancs) HAA Rgt. 
  In December 1942, 178th HAA Rgt HQ arrived to take command of the AA units in the islands, and 290 HAA Bty was regimented with that unit. A Gun Operations Room (GOR) was established at Thorshavn.
  There were almost daily overflights by Ju 88 or Dornier Do 17 bombers and reconnaissance aircraft, but these were mixed with friendly aircraft on patrol or Search and rescue missions, and permission to engage was often denied by the Royal Air Force station commander at Vaago. On many occasions the target could be heard but not seen, or only glimpsed through a break in the clouds. Although the HAA guns fired three or four times in a typical month, often causing the targets to take evasive action, there were no confirmed 'kills'. By December 1943 the air threat to the Faroes had diminished, and the defences could be reduced. 290 HAA Bty handed over four 3.7-inch guns to a newly-formed composite 507 AA Bty, and returned to the UK on 19 March 1943 with 178th HAA Rgt. 178th HAA Regiment was disbanded in May 1944.
caption: Preserved 3.7-inch HAA gun on static mount.
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