803 NAS

803 Naval Air Squadron
803 Naval Air Squadron crest
Active	1932–1937, 1938–1969
Country	UK
Branch	Royal Navy
Role	fighter squadron
Part of	Fleet Air Arm
Motto(s)	Cave Punctum (Latin for "Beware of the sting")
Anniversaries	none
Battle honours	North Sea 1939 Norway 1940 Libya 1940–41 Matapan 1941 Crete 1941 Mediterranean 1941–44

803 Naval Air Squadron was a Royal Navy Fleet Air Arm squadron.

803 NAS was formed on 3 April 1933 by promoting No 409 (Fleet Fighter) Flight to the status of a squadron, with nine Ospreys. In the same month it embarked on HMS Eagle for the Far East, where it remained (transferring to HMS Hermes in January 1935) until disbandment on 1 October 1937.

803 Squadron was re-formed on 21 November 1938 at RNAS Worthy Down out of 'B' Flight of No 800 Squadron. Equipped with six Ospreys and three Nimrods, then (from December 1938) six Skuas and three Nimrods, the squadron embarked on the HMS Ark Royal in April 1938 as an RAF squadron but was transferred to Admiralty control on 24 May 1939.

At the outbreak of World War II, the Skuas and Rocs which formed 803 Squadron were embarked on HMS Ark Royal. Operating out of Scapa Flow, the squadron carried out anti-submarine patrols in the Northwestern Approaches (losing two Skuas in an attack on U-30 on 14 September 1939 and defending SS Fanad Head) and regular patrols off Norway (during which the squadron shot down the first German aircraft to be shot down by a British aircraft in the war, a Dornier 18, on 26 September 1939). The squadron's activities continued off Norway (though leaving her Rocs behind), operating there in April 1940 from HMS Glorious. 803 and 800 Squadrons successfully dive bombed and sank the German cruiser Königsberg at Bergen (with 800 providing five aircraft and seven crews in contrast to 803's eleven aircraft and nine crews), though an attack by 803 from Ark Royal on the German battleship Scharnhorst in June was less successful, with the loss of all but two aircraft.