B.O.S.T. Portland
(This story was originally written for a non RFA/RN audience)
Every ship loves to see another one cock things up. I think it basically alleviates despair. So to lighten the mood a little.
At one time the Brazilian Navy were quite regular “customers” at Portland, working up their new Niteroi class frigates.
BNS Constituicao – F42
Brazilian Niteroi class frigate
They looked like large versions of our “Amazon” type frigates. I can never remember type numbers, preferring names. But what a wildcat bunch they were. Every one a Grand Prix driver. It was glorious to watch “Niteroi” doing a “rapid departure” evolution. A pity that the order to let go the ropes first wasn’t given. Snapped ropes everywhere and even a couple of bollards uprooted from the quay. FOST response to this was a bit more measured than it would have been if the ship had been RN. Something on the lines (no pun intended) of “Enthusiasm when leaving harbour is to be commended, but attention should be given to preparations” But the Brazilians had one more surprise in store. Due for an early morning final departure many, many people in the Portland area awoke to find their bicycles missing. Never to be seen again.
Now and again an RFA Chief Officer is appointed to Portland as senior “sea rider”. Often to the annoyance of the RN. One guy I knew quite well tells a nice story about a German destroyer. He was “riding” this ship during a Thursday War”, and one of the pre-programmed evolutions was a Man Overboard exercise. The ships “swimmer” was briefed and kitted up, and at the appointed time he “fell” overboard. The ship was hammering down the Channel on a “war” footing. No action was taken about the man overboard. Our man attempted to prompt the Commander into action. His response was “Ve are at Vor,Ja? OK, Ve go on”…leaving the poor swimmer stuck all alone in the middle of the English Channel. He was eventually picked up by another ship. This particular Commander was obviously intent on playing things for real and also sticking it to the RN big time. During his harbour week the local employees at the base decided to go on strike for some reason or another. In the late 70s it didn’t take much effort to get “the lads” out on strike. This strike also forced the local power station to shut down. German answer? An armed platoon who “interned” the strikers pickets and his own engineers restored power. This was NOT an exercise! Now’t wishy-washy about that guy.
A “naughty” about the RFA. For those not familiar with the main passage into Portland / Weymouth, there is a very large and awkwardly sited sandbank which helps define the infamous “Portland Race”. It is well marked with buoys, but the tides can be unforgiving. One lunchtime the watch keeper on RFA “Olwen” was trying to make up for lost time and got it wrong. On a falling tide to make matters worse. Nicely aground. The National dailies loved it. Alas, at the time the RFA was running a national recruitment drive that said…in essence…” Join the RFA and visit places other ships do not normally go”. Good timing!
The RN/RFA used standard Admiralty charts with overprinting for their own purposes. One of which is (was) to make the Portland exercise areas a quite unique bit of ocean. Naturally, the real geographical points were left “as is” (stupid not to), but the overprinting included things like make-believe sandbanks and other hazards. These were treated as “real” by working up ships as part of the navigational training and woe betide those who treated them as “less than real”. These “hazards” were printed in more or less the same way as found on a standard chart, but it was always pretty clear as to what was “real” and what “wasn’t”. The charts themselves were always treated as genuine and were kept as up to date as the real ones. In fact, it was very rare for a “non-Portland” chart to be used except during a real emergency.
Another, and perhaps more important set of overprints were the “boxes”. The Portland exercise areas covered an awful lot of liquid real estate, from well to the East and West of Portland and to about half way across the English Channel. The Channel in these areas was, of course, always open to normal shipping…how could it be otherwise…which could make things “interesting” at times. The entire area was divided into “boxes” printed in various colours and occasionally even overlapping each other. Boxes came in many sizes from quite small (perhaps a couple of square miles) to huge. Apart from the submarine areas that do not concern us here the biggest was the RAS Corridor. This was an E-W area of maybe 40 miles by 5. A RAS would generally be carried out at 12 knots…although if operationally required it could be increased, with a consequent rise in the danger level. I think the fastest one I was involved in was done at 18 knots. A bit scary. The corridor is E-W for two reasons. Prevailing weather and tides, and the impracticality of going in any other direction. An upwind course is generally preferred but downwind is pretty common. Portland being Portland a wind from the N or S or any point between had to be expected and dealt with. The worst case would be an arranged RAS with a frigate which had to spend a fair while preparing, and then the wind would change…as would the sea. The last thing a little frigate would want would be to stuck on the windward side of a large replenishment ship. Changing rigs was perhaps a 30 minute job, but a heck of a lot longer for a frigate…especially if they only had one probe. “Probe”?. A very sexual beast.
The refuelling probe crosses over from the tanker
The supply ship is equipped with a large male appendage, and the receptor has a large “bell mouthed” “female” part. When the connecting jackstay between the 2 ships is connected the “male” part slides down the jackstay, slams into the receptor and begins pumping. A RAS takes as long as it takes..hence the length of the corridor. (In real operations, we could do a “pump over” from one tanker to another that could take up to 12 hours….all at 100ft apart). But as indicated in the previous Views from the Bridge the ships have to be in the correct box, at the correct time, on the correct course and at the correct speed and positioned in the right part of the box by “start-time”. The Navs and Ops officers cannot collude against this FOST dictat. It is workable, if done correctly. Hence a lot of stress, which is precisely what Portland is all about. And none of these evolutions is done in isolation. Ships transitting to an R/V point can have a galley fire, an aircraft crash on deck or even (a rather popular one) the Commanding Officer has a heart attack..and so structures and responsibilities have to be re-jigged “on the hoof”. And the show would have to go on…..because we are being trained for a war at sea, and THAT is a hell of a lot different from chugging from point A to point B.
All these evolutions start quite slowly for a “newbie” ship, and build up pretty quickly over the following 2 or 3 weeks. During their (hopefully) final week they are full participants in the “Thursday War”. To make up the numbers of participants the “not quite ready” ships are co-opted, but at this stage are not required to be on a “war footing”, although they will still have to deal with FOST engendered “problems” (no easy ride here!). The experience also gives the “newbies” a bit of a taste of what to expect when they are promoted to the “first team”.
Portland in summer can be quite benign. Stressful, sure. But winter is another thing altogether. Still the stress, but add a lot of weather induced misery on top.
Horrible.
Next is the “Thursday War”.
