SBS flying boats take on jihadis

COMMANDOS protecting UK waters against terrorists can now fly their high-speed patrol boat into action slung beneath helicopters.

The Special Boat Service’s rigid inflatable craft have previously been dropped from the rear ramp of a Chinook chopper with their weapons and equipment stowed inside.

The troops would jump off the helicopter into the water and climb on to the vessel.

Now, to save vital seconds in a crisis, the special forces can fly into action in the speedboat while it hangs from the aircraft.

The ten-man SBS units can be flown in at low level to intercept potential targets.

Practice exercises have already taken place at a remote lake in Wales and off the Dorset coast, close to the SBS base at Poole.

The UK’s Maritime Counter Terrorism team has a range of personnel, including bomb disposal experts and medics, on permanent standby.

Intelligence chiefs fear terrorists could strike a range of targets from oil rigs to passenger ferries.

They also fear the huge numbers of commercial ships that dock in UK ports every day could be used to smuggle in would-be jihadis. Among the worst-case scenarios they have trained for are an oil tanker being hijacked off the south coast, a cruise liner being taken over and a bomb planted on a container ship.

In the summer, security sources warned that tankers carrying highly-explosive liquified natural gas from the Middle East could be blown up while docked in UK ports.