HMS Blackburn (1944)

HMS Blackburn was the lead ship of the Blackburn-class aircraft transports built for the Royal Navy in World War II.

In July 1968 the ship was sold to Pounds Shipowners and Shipbreakers Ltd in Portsmouth, but was subsequently sold again to Gardline Shipping in Great Yarmouth, a company founded in 1969 to provide offshore services to the oil and gas industry in the North Sea.

In July 1985 the ship played a key role in the recovery of the cockpit voice recorder (CVR) and the flight data recorder (FDR) of Air India Flight 182 that disintegrated in mid air after a bomb explosion on 23 June 1985 with 329 people on board off the southwest coast of Ireland.

On 4 July, Gardline Locater detected the signals of these boxes on the sea bed at a depth of more than 2000 meters.

On 9 July, Scarab 1 pinpointed the CVR and raised it to the surface; the next day, she also located and recovered the FDR.