It had previously operated Lockheed TriStar K1, KC1 and C2s from RAF Brize Norton, Oxfordshire, between November 1984 and March 2014.

7 Squadron of the Royal Naval Air Service (RNAS) sent a detachment of four Handley Page O/100 to Redcar in order to fly anti-submarine missions.

[6] On the night of 24/25 March, an aircraft from the squadron carried out an 8 and a half hour attack on Cologne.

These aircraft had been embarked on HMS Ark Royal[10] until flying off for the last time in November 1978 for a delivery flight from the carrier in the Mediterranean to RAF St Athan.

XV Squadron Buccaneer crashed after a wing failed in flight during the Red Flag exercise in the USA.

[5][13] Following the Falklands War, the RAF found itself lacking in the strategic transport capabilities required to sustain the expanded military presence there; this shortfall was filled initially by chartered British Airways Boeing 747s and Britannia Airways Boeing 767s.

The first TriStar (ZD949) was leased back to British Airways on 29 March 1983 until November, eventually undergoing conversion at Cambridge Airport by Marshall Aerospace in 1986.

216 Squadron would reform to become an experimental unit that will test future drone swarm technology.

[25] In March 2024, James Cartlidge, the minister for defence procurement, informed Parliament that notwithstanding its formation in 2020, 216 Squadron had “completed [no] tests or trials [of any drones] ... either in-house or with industry” since being reconstituted.

[26] In a large change, Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Defence Luke Pollard answered a written parliamentary question stating that the squadron will transition from its current role as the swarming drone trials unit "to become the operational delivery squadron for an Autonomous Collaborative Platforms [ACP] capability in 2025."