7th Parachute Regiment Royal Horse Artillery

7th Parachute Regiment Royal Horse Artillery
Active	27 June 1961 – present All of the individual batteries were formed in the period 1800-1805 and have existed continuously since their formation.
Allegiance	United Kingdom
Branch	British Army
Role	Parachute Light Artillery
Size	4 Batteries
Part of	16 Air Assault Brigade
Garrison/HQ	Merville Barracks, Colchester
Nickname(s)	The Airborne Gunners
Drop Zone Flash
Equipment	L118 Light Gun

7th Parachute Regiment Royal Horse Artillery (7 Para RHA) is a regiment of the Royal Artillery in the British Army. It currently^[update] serves in the field artillery role with 16 Air Assault Brigade, and is equipped with the L118 Light Gun.

The regiment was constituted in 1961 out of existing batteries that have served continuously since the Napoleonic Wars.

The regiment was formed on 27 June 1961 with the re-designation of 33rd Parachute Light Regiment Royal Artillery as 7th Parachute Regiment Royal Horse Artillery. The regiment first saw action in the middle-east in Kuwait in 1961 and then in Aden in 1963–65 where it was involved in fierce fighting in the Radfan mountains. The 1970s and 80’s saw the regiment involved in four Northern Ireland tours in the infantry role as well as a period where they briefly lost their airborne status and were arms-plotted to Germany until 1984 when they joined newly formed 5th Airborne Brigade and returned to Aldershot.

In 1994 the regiment deployed to Cyprus as part of the UN mission to patrol the buffer-zone between Cypriot and Turkish forces. This was followed in 1996–97 with two battery deployments to Bosnia as part of the NATO mission and the Kosovo campaign of 1999.

Since the formation of 16 Air Assault Brigade in 1999, 7 Para RHA has been involved in numerous overseas operations. The Sierra Leone campaign in summer 2000 was followed by Op Essential Harvest in Macedonia a year later and then two batteries deployed to the Kabul area of Afghanistan in early 2002.

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Wikipedia