This comes from the confessional section of The Register. See here (https://www.theregister.co.uk/2019/07/15/who-me/) for the full article.

The BBC crew were filming this thing from the 1970s.

Sailor 02 of 12 The Squadrons Are Coming 1976.avi - YouTube

A particular BBC cameraman had been a jerk to the crew members who were in ship maintenance, including those who worked on the radar systems.

It was noted that the annoying cameraman also had a bag full of flash cubes (https://www.flashbulbs.com/philips/ph-8.html). So as the story goes ...

"We succumbed to temptation and set the radar to the dummy load, wound up the power and then proceeded to sector scan the cameraman."

"Now a couple of mW may not sound much, but the peak power he (and his flash cubes) were subjected to was closer to 200mW… easily capable of firing a flash cube by irradiation."

He added: "Irradiation by a 3GHz source causes electricity to flow in unprotected circuits.

"That is precisely what happened, and he suddenly had a large smouldering bag with many expired flash cubes and a large trail of smoke."

As freshly smoking combusty stuff on a flight deck is frowned upon, they also had "the added pleasure (from our perspective) of seeing him hosed down to prevent a more serious fire hazard" before "he was given a right royal bollocking for carrying 'flammable equipment' on the deck without permission."

The (formerly annoyed) maintenance crew were quite very satisfied with the outcome.

Andrew

That's quite an entertaining story, which definitely raised my eyebrows!

Just wanted to say that this particular YouTube video is also well worth watching for anyone who, like me, is interested in naval aviation.

Very interesting video. Watched the video about half way through because I was interested in the landing part. Carrier landings are not for sissies.

Having practiced doing a carrier landing on land it gives ya a real pucker factor. One is essentially on the backside of the power curve. Unlike a regular landing where one approaches at a low power with flaps just above a stall and just glide in, the carrier pilot lands with a lot of power on, high attitude, and near a stall. Had a carrier pilot instructor and never got accustomed to doing this. Did not like it.

Failure to get it correct means one plows into the back end of the carrier, or if too hot, does a go-around (but you can do that only so long until the fuel runs out).

Watching this video one can almost guess if it’s gong to be a go-around by looking at the exhaust. If its dark because there is a lot of power-on, then it’ll probably be a landing. If there isn’t much exhaust smoke then the landing is probably too hot.

These guys have guts. Look at the million$ wrapped up in the plane and the ship, and everybody is watching from the deck and the bridge.

Speaking of flash bulbs: There were strobe flashes in the mid ‘60s, and this guy was still using bulbs? My Ultrablitz was a circa ~ late ’63 or ’64 if I recall. Still have it and it still works. Well, the last time I tested it, it still worked. Have to keep the capacitor alive.

At one point there's a new pilot having a hard time coming aboard; he misses several approaches in a row. We're seeing this from the flight operations control room up in the island and one of the senior officers, I suppose he's the commander of the air group, remarks that the newbie will have to go land ashore if he misses this last try... an ignominious and shameful fate for a green carrier pilot if there ever was one. Last chance as the aircraft turns onto short final, and the observing officers offer their play-by-play critiques for the benefit of the camera. The hook catches, he made it! A cheer goes up with applause in the flight control room. There's much more to see besides this, however. It's quite a well-done little documentary. Thanks so much for sharing it.

It's part of a series that the BBC made about HMS Ark Royal https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sailor_(TV_series)

This was nice, thanks for the video too. Great story.

My daughter served on the uss nemitz and was on the rescue/ emergency truck on deck. heard lots of stories, great seeing the video.

Brought back memories as the Marines used those old 36 choppers, went down twice, once in a 36, not my favorite flying machine.