During the cold war the Bristish militray ordered around 5,900 of these watches were ever manufactured and issued to the RAF in May 1953. Consequently, they are rather appropriately referred to today as the “53 Omegas”.
These watches originally had thin arrow radium dials but were considered too dangerous, and ordered to be replaced with MoD when stockpiled so subsequently they were replaced with tritium dials.
The solid steel case has integrated lugs which provided a durable construction along side the antimagnetic dust cap case to protect the caliber 283 movement.
