Number 82 Royal Air Force Gliding School was based at Roborough Down Airfield in Plymouth and disbanded at Royal Naval Air Station St Merryn near Newquay in Cornwall in 1950. The Royal Navy's Fleet Air Arm ran RNAS St Merryn and was responsible for operating naval aircraft on ships and land. After the terms of German surrender and the Treaty of Versailles at the end of World War One, Germany had to demilitarise and turned to gliding as an alternative to motorised aircraft.