HMS Albion has returned to Devonport after completing a deployment to the Mediterranean as part of Operation Achillean.

The operation involved nine warships, F-35B Lightning jets, helicopters, and thousands of sailors and Royal Marines Commandos.

Over the course of three months, HMS Albion sailed nearly 50,000 miles and visited more than a dozen countries across three continents as part of the Littoral Response Group North task force, which also included the ships RFA Argus, HMS Defender, and RFA Mounts Bay.

The task group operated in the central and eastern Mediterranean, North Africa, and the Adriatic, working with Spain, Libya, Cyprus, Turkey, Egypt, Montenegro, Croatia, Malta, Tunisia, Greece, Algeria, and Italy.

While HMS Albion was deployed, the Royal Navy flagship HMS Queen Elizabeth and her Carrier Strike Group carried out operations in the North Sea.

Captain Marcus Hember, HMS Albion’s Commanding Officer, said that the task group had achieved a lot during its busy months and that the skill, hard work, and dedication of the sailors and Commandos had been instrumental in its success. He also noted that the task group had visited many countries, building stronger ties with allies and partners, and said he was confident that the ship’s company would continue to deliver in the year ahead.

“It is remarkable what the task group achieved in these busy months. It is a testament to the skill, hard work, and dedication of each sailor and Commando. The task group has visited more than a dozen countries, forging closer links with our allies and partners.

I have no doubt that the ship’s company will continue to deliver to the end of this deployment and in the year ahead in 2023.”

George Allison
George Allison
George has a degree in Cyber Security from Glasgow Caledonian University and has a keen interest in naval and cyber security matters and has appeared on national radio and television to discuss current events. George is on Twitter at @geoallison
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41 COMMENTS

    • I would assume that’s the plan. There’s not enough crew or probably kit to operate both outside of an emergency. I could see them still going in 2040.

    • HMS Fearless went for 37 years so i don’t see why the Albion’s can’t go until 2040. Will give us time to build the 3 FSSS at Belfast then start on the MRSS with Argus and the Bay’s going first and the Albion’s going last in the 2040’s that’s should give H&W 20+ years of orders.

        • Yeah it’s kind of crazy how they keep extending it. She has been written of more times than I can count and performed almost ever role in the amphibious force. She had to be the best second hand purchase ever made by HMG. Hopefully the new MRSS are similar to her in concept but with all the kinks worked out.

          • The good thing about most new vessels is that they seem to be designing them to last a while now, which should hopefully mean in the long term the defence budget won’t be as stretched as they won’t need replacing as often. Aren’t the carriers designed to not be replaced for like 50 years or something?

          • Yes they are, the UK has always had an obsession with junking stuff not being used to save some money however as we are seeing in Ukraine it can be handy to have stuff sitting around. Items like amphibious ships are needed at most once a decade but when you need them you can never get enough. We don’t need every vessel in the amphibious fleet fully crewed all the time, having vessels in extended readiness can be useful and we can keep vessels longer as the US does to grow the fleet.

          • Things like amphibious ships are potentially better for keeping in extended readiness than frigates or destroyers.

            That said a lot of it depends on how high a state of readiness they are kept in.

            • Engines started a couple of times a month.
            • HVAC running to control condensation/corrosion
            • Systems kept powered or regularly fully powered
            • Radar and comms fully up-to-date

            Oh, and one minor thing. A viable plan to find a fully trained crew?

            It all easily degrades to a stripped hull in a reasonable state after a few years of STOROB and then ‘it isn’t worth the amount of money we are paying for caretaker crew and power’ so lets shut it down and leave her. Then it is really rotten row in a few years.

            I do agree with the general point that MOD have had to look deep into hangars and stores of things that many senior people had stated were of no conceivable use. It turned out that many of these things were of very great use!

            The haste to get rid of things off the books is down to the Treasury, Green Book, which sets out the various asset charges and charging mechanism. So getting assets off the books fast is a priority.

          • True but in a real emergency you will always have potential for bringing in old personnel potentially from staff appointments or reenlistments. Ukraine has showed much the same as in 1982 that human forces can be rapidly expanded and solution can be found for many problems. Old military kit can still be useful but if you don’t have equipment, vessels and aircraft you can’t make any more in a reasonable timescale.

          • The extended readiness on LPD is a well trodden path.
            I was on Bulwalk as Albion went in and was due to go to Albion in 2014/5 as the WO Weapons and bring it out of readiness…that was until someone made me a job offer with less hours, no sea time, no tax and no snow in winter!

            The ships are sealed up and dehumidified. Liquid Systems are preserved with preserving liquids. Weapons, radars etc are removed shore side for update/overhaul. Yes they get STORROB’d so that is an issue. The biggest issue is the HV Propulsion and Power system. You cannot simply put thousands of volts onto machinery and cables that have been out of use for years. You need to conduct checks of cables and systems to ensure it wont go bang when power goes on. That takes a fair bit of time and the QA checks are extensive. You do not take shortcuts with +6kV HV systems.

          • I thought Albion coming out of Extended Readiness didn’t go that smoothly. The lesson learned was that it was cheaper to keep her at a higher state of readiness than leave her alone powered down.

          • Going in is straight forward and a well trodden path. The big issue as I said was HV. I dont think anyone had ever put a HV ship in extended readiness for that long. Bringing HV back up was a “challenge”…

          • Which is why, as I understood it, firing up the HV system was on the list of lessons learned that must periodically happen during extended readiness.

      • It was said that HMS Fearless was in a bad state for the last few years she was in service. could be a bit like the two Fort 1 class tied up along side for the last few years of there service

  2. I’m always amazed at the miles the ships do on these deployments and the amount of countries they work with while out and about. 50k miles is a lot but I much prefer the sausage, eggs and weetabix measurements, I wonder how many times they flooded the well deck

      • I did catering for marines/sbs reserves and sometimes they would say they had double the people that were there so they could have double portions. Some would eat cereal, huge cooked breakfast and fruit before 7.30!
        They could eat a well deck or weetabix.

  3. First up, that’s a great photo up top. I might be missing something from my couch but looks like this LRG, while a great model of capability does not have any missile land attack ability, no escorting sub, no real ASW ability, and just one medium 4.5” gun! Would you want to risk a T45 in a littoral environment? I’d think some land attack T31 or T32 variants that would be served here. An enemy sub would have a field day with this group as it is. T45s should also get their limited ASW capabilities and Wildcats upgraded or provide a T23 in the LRG at least. Maybe even put at least 12xCAMM on all RFAs as well?
    On a bit of a tangent, why are they decommissioning HMS Montrose before any T26/T31s are commissioned? Will they possibly donate it to Ukraine, even do up Monmouth to work with the three Sea Kings?

  4. No mention of some of HMS Albion’s crew brawling in Casemates sq with the police which resulted in 5 arrests , and the ship told to leave Gibraltar .
    Well done guys , tarnished the reputation of the Royal Navy for goodness how long no doubt Royal Navy ships will Not be welcome for a long time now !

    • You haven’t seen anything until you have seen Jack having a boxing match in the square , each contestant with a roast chicken on each fist…Oh the joys of runs ashore in Gib…

      Could be worse Grimson could have been onboard…

      • George Osborne was Chancellor and 2015 review.
      • Def Sec couldn’t save all of Ocean, Albion and Bulwark, so he saved Albion and Bulwark.
      • There were insufficient sailors to crew the fleet and something had to go.
      • The ship wasn’t well built.
      • They found a buyer.

      All sorts of reasons. But none of them involve a flat-top being unneeded. Pity they didn’t they buy the two “Russian” Mistrals. But George Osborne was Chancellor and….

      • Thanks for that Jon, and Gunbuster for that matter. To be honest I had no idea that the Royal Navy was so depleted in numbers.

        ‘Oh here a new boat, but we have to flog a couple in order to crew them’. That’s crazy.

    • The crew was needed on POW.
      It was a bespoke RN vessel built to Civvy standards.
      Its systems and machinery was obsolete and no longer supported or made by the original manufacturers some of which where no longer in existence.
      It was and would have become an even bigger money pit.
      It lacked anything like the C4 fit on the LPDs
      It could carry only a limited number of light vehicles
      It would have needed an LPD with it to provide heavy vehicle support ( Fuel and water tankers, Supply trucks) and logistics to anything it put ashore by helo.

      • Isn’t she still being used by new owner. They must be really worried that they will be stuck not being able to source new replacement parts when needed.

        • Brazil will probably not use her heavily like the Royal Navy. They probably do a lot more work arounds to keep it running if needed. It’s useful ship for Brazil as it keeps them in the flat top game and is useful for the islands and off shore oil industry they have.
          Once the Royal Navy get the new frigates into service at the carriers running fully we may well see other ships being bought. To much stuff for the RN just now getting frigates built, expensive solid stores ships, destroyers upgraded and the unmanned stuff bought.

          • It is a different approach.

            If they need to change a pump they will just change it for whatever comes out of a catalogue or local factory. If the wiring needs to be changed it will just be changed.

            So damage control standards are constantly eroded.

            Everything that is changed on a warship has to be considered for fire, fuel load, smoke load, extinguishability, how it would impact fire fighting, battle damage resistance, shock resistance etc etc one apparently trivial change can massively alter the survivability of a compartment or even a whole ship.

            Which is why parts cannot just be ordered randomly from whoever is cheapest that day!

        • They were operating WW 2 carriers recently so I’m guessing spares and logistics are not a major concern to them. We still have HMS Warrior sitting along side 😀

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