After flying more than 18,000 hours in Afghanistan, moving more than 7,900 tonnes of kit and stores and transporting over 130,000 personnel since 2009, RAF Merlin helicopters have finished their deployment in the Helmand region, where they have primarly flown troop transport missions.
The following images where released by the UK MoD, and show one of the large, partly disassembled choppers (the same used for the 2012 Olympic opener and latest 007 movie) inside a RAF C-17 Globemaster transport aircraft used to bring the Merlins back home.
Image credit: Sergeant Barry Pope, Crown copyright
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