HMS Shoreham was carrying out training when her ‘captain spied a buoy bobbing in the water’, say the Royal Navy.
The Royal Navy add that sailors monitored the buoy for a while to determine its drift rate and likely course based on the weather conditions, “which suggested it would soon end up in busy shipping lanes”.
“Close inspection of the marker – used to warn mariners of dangers such as shallow waters, navigational hazards or shipwrecks – suggested it had already been hit. Having spent the rest of the day practising demolition drills to render mines safe, Shoreham’s divers used their skill and knowledge to place an explosive charge on the underside of buoy. They withdrew a safe distance and BOOM! The errant buoy ended up on the sea bed.”
“It was great to get the chance to use the skills we’ve been practising for months. It’s always good to try something a little bit different to what we train for, especially when it helps keep the seas safe,” said 38-year-old Leading Diver Liam Pulman.
To confirm it was no longer a danger, Shoreham’s team inspected the wreck using her sonar – more typically used to locate mines – and marked it on the charts for authorities added the Royal Navy.
“Ensuring the safety of shipping throughout the Gulf features prominently in the tasking of Royal Navy units in the area and Shoreham was only too happy to help keep fellow mariners safe by removing this hazard – as well as taking advantage of an opportunity to put their skills to the test,” said Lieutenant Commander Rich Kemp, Shoreham’s Commanding Officer.
Boy oh buoy!
Not the first time RN’s finest have ‘blown up a boy’ 🙂
Wasn’t Rodger the cabin boy by any chance was it?
Give us a kiss and I’ll tell all!
Lieutenant Commander shortening his 1st name to ensure absolutely no confusion with the former Colonel who shares his name…
Who could confuse a warrior IFV commsnder with a MCMV comnander? Oh wait, might be a Daily Wail journo out there. Good drills that man!
Hahaha was testing the waters on people’s opinion on him. From afar he seemed like a good boss but with his social media it’s hard to see what are his real thoughts or those he is paid to out forward
BBC reports significant increase in defence spending, over and above the 0.5% increase in inflation previously announced in the last Tory manifesto. £16.5 billion increase over 4 years.
Mainly for cyber, space, and autonomous system spending it seems. We are still likely to have to lose some so called “legacy” equipment such as tanks and frigates. Hopefully the latter will be temporary and doesn’t mean a reduction in T26/T31 orders. Fingers crossed this review doesn’t become the unfunded disaster of past efforts. Ben Wallace has said this himself numerous times so I have hope this time it will be a better outcome all round.
Tanks will remain, just fewer.
I don’t follow how increases of that size over 4 years will be mainly on cyber, artificial intelligence and space.
Joint Cyber Command and it’s component units already exist. A National Cyber force would be essentially a re branding and moderate increase, I cannot see how it would cost billions.
A Space Command will be limited, launching a rocket by 2022 with a limited capability does not swallow billions. We already have a space centre and satellite capabilities.
The artificial intelligence agency has not been outlined yet and may not even sit under Mod.
I expect the RN to get an uplift, and some other areas like combat air, more drones that are more useful than a toy aeroplane, both carriers used, FSS, more escorts, and other areas like SF.
I also hope to see the army completely reorganised.
No need for fantasy fleets, just keeping most of what we have, including the niche assets, is a result.
Yes there will still be some cuts to help reduce the black hole ( there always are ) but this is looking like a kick in the teeth to those here and elsewhere who’ve been almost begging for doomsday due to Covid.
I’m optimistic.
Previously HMT, who traditionally are the worst enemy our forces face only wanted minor increases or a 1 year settlement, which would have wrecked the ISDR before it began.
A multi year deal like this is massive for defence.
As an addition to the subject of space, I’ve just read that Skynet is being brought back in house. That will no doubt take a big chunk of the space command money.
1001SU reborn?
Why should this be within the extra 16 billion? If it was commercially managed it was still paid for by the MoD. It may be, but this replaces existing satellites and is not cyber or space rocketry. As recently as July the MoD paid millions to Airbus for contracts for Skynet.
Hi Trevor
I believe that while MOD pays for Skynet, they are owned and run by private companies.
MoD still owns the facilities from where they are run.
Might be wrong of course, but I took it to meaning a return of military staffed control elements, which until the early 2000s were provided by the RAF until the lot was privatised.
If a UK Space Command is to have any teeth or hardware beyond the small NSpoC and BMEWs elements that have been around for decades, then adding Skynet to the small satellites like Carbonite and Artemis may be in the offing.
227 challengers in service and 70 in storage according to wiki. I hope
they do not cut any more ,the numbers are too small as it is.
Bound to mate. 150, 160 tops is my bet.
Yes I agree, it is very positive.
Still a £13bn black hole but half of that can be plugged by cutting the F35B order to a more realistic number. At £100m per aircraft a reduction from 138 to say 70 would save £6.8bn and leave the QEC class with a decent fighter wing. I am assuming of course that the total cost of this program was included in the ‘black hole’. I would see such a move as positive and just realigning ambition with realism.
I agree Rob.
Hi Daniele! I was waiting for UKDJ to post a dedicated article on this before commenting but seeing as you guys have opened the debate..
As an older guy I would have hoped that 16 billion over four years would give us more hardware in the form of even a small extra number of items e.g an eighth Astute or a couple more T 26’s or Type 31’s, but in this new age we need to spend money on the new unglamorous-dare I say boring items-cyber security, drones etc.. Still a welcome move. lets hope they spend it wisely!
Cheers
Morning geoff. Pouring and overcast in Surrey.
I doubt we will see anything like that. Great if we do mind.
Just keeping most of what we have and increasing modestly in certain areas is a massive win in my opinion, full details of review outstanding of course.
It is not just cyber security, lots of it involves digitisation and advanced communications and situational awareness networks merging the domains.
I’ve also just listened to the PM describing our armoured vehicles and ships equipped with lasers. A version of Dragonfire I presume?
Multi year budget – especially over 4 years should speed up T26 should it not? Allow economies of scale to take over… Same with T31 and even astute.
Rough calculation… The extra £4+ billion per year will increase the GDP % from 2.3% to around 2.53% of GDP – definitely encouraging.
May even push us up towards the $70 Billion/year mark – (same as Russia) and towards 4th highest spender behind Saudi Arabia? Not that the figure itself makes a difference but as I said… Encouraging.
My GDP numbers may be a little awry there but either way it’s around a 0.2%+ increase… Actual figures may be 2.1% GDP up towards 2.35% GDP when considering the new funding…
I heard there would be more money being put into Tempest with this increase in spending as well. Which is good as it makes the idea seem more plausible.
That’s a lot of cyber space for 4.5 billion. We see regular moans about defence cuts but … 1. defence was promised extra .5% over inflation and now — 2. we get extra 4.5 billion a year
And you and others complain.
My main complaint is that we cannot get proper spaced paragraphs from this website!
How was I complaining? Its great news.
My comments about cuts to tanks, frigates etc follow quotes from Ben Wallace over the last 24 hours. T23s will be retired early, but not a surprise as some of them are due to have LIFEX just a few years before their planned retirement.
It’s the MoD though 2/3rds of that budget will disappear into consultant’s pockets and on diversity training
I saw a report on the BBC website last night and put it on here (can’t remember which threat, DOH!).
In it the reporter indicated that the up lift was £4b per year (so £16b over 4 years).
However, it was also suggest that this increase it was on top of the already promised inflation plus 0.5% up lift. The report has been taken down, but if that does prove the case then the compounded value of the up lift (inc inflation) is close to a £64b annual spend after after 4 years if inflation is 3%.
Good news. Now all we need is for the Army to get a grip of its AFV programme.
Cheers CR
The ISDR I read is delayed for that reason- the army.
They need to decide what they want.
While it’s fun to blow stuff up, this seems like a flimsy excuse.
Just hearing rumour of the Type 32 Frigate. Sounds like a second batch of the T31 but with bells and whistles (i.e. a 5inch gun, more Sea Ceptor and anti-ship missiles). Sounds good as the T31s will be a stop gap then sold on and the drumbeat of hulls continued at Rosyth. The ambition has to be to get up around 30 escorts to maintain the fleet at sea and not in port. Other than that this announcement probably means the rest of the MOD’s programmes being funded properly with the bolt on of cyber and some very ‘joint’ Anglo-US space and AI development. Very much the best we could hope for I think.
Not a chance of getting up to 30-ship frigate & destroyer fleet. Every penny of this additional money would have to be spent on it.
We may get additional Type 31s and have more bells and whistles, as you say. I could see them getting the 5 inch gun, 24 x Sea Ceptor missiles and 8 anti-ship missiles bolted onto the deck on quad canister launchers.
At best, might go from 19 frigates & destroyers to 22-24. I’d be happy with that.