HMS Prince of Wales has extended a heartfelt welcome to its new commanding officer, Captain Will Blackett.
This transition marks a new chapter for the aircraft carrier, which recently concluded a milestone deployment along the United States’ east coast.
Captain Blackett takes the helm at an exciting yet challenging time for Britain’s largest warship, which returned to its base at Portsmouth last month. His assumption of command coincides with the departure of the former commanding officer, Captain Hewitt OBE.
Today, we say farewell to our Commanding Officer, Captain Hewitt OBE RN, who has overseen a successful 2023.
And a very warm welcome to Captain Will Blackett Royal Navy who has assumed Command of @HMSPWLS. pic.twitter.com/dZgNOT2u9t
— HMS Prince of Wales (@HMSPWLS) January 3, 2024
Under Captain Hewitt’s leadership, 2023 was a year of remarkable achievements for the carrier, a sentiment echoed in a recent post on X, the platform that has replaced Twitter.
The carrier’s return to Portsmouth was a momentous occasion, with crowds gathering along the city walls in December to welcome the sailors. However, the journey to this point has not been without its hurdles. HMS Prince of Wales faced a major setback when it encountered mechanical issues during its initial sail-out for trials last year. The incident necessitated extensive repairs, which took nine months to complete and incurred costs of around £25 million.
Captain Blackett’s leadership comes at a time when the carrier is rebounding from these challenges and building on its operational successes.
Best wishes to both of them. Have to say the rate the RN changes its carrier COs is interesting. Does it mean they then expect to move to a senior staff role? How many Commodores and Rear Admirals do we need? Must be getting awfully crowded.
I wish the Decks were crowded.
😄 indeed
Frank, oh so true !
I agree, they seem to rushing the CO’s through. Less than two years seems to be the norm for command of a QEC. I suppose there is a considerable backlog of Senior Captains who deserve a shot at commanding a “capital ship”. Notable that Captain Hewitt doesn’t seem to have been promoted to Commodore, as has been previous practice, no spaces left at the top? Or maybe some mud has stuck from POWs embarrassing and high profile breakdown in June 2022.
Not everyone gets promoted after a command tour.
Why would Hewitt have been blamed for a breakdown?
Paraphrasing Napoleon “I would rather have a Captain who was lucky than one who was good”.
Maybe they want to broaden the experience of as many officers as possible, in the context of a limited number of major platforms.
The article did not say how long Capt Hewitt had in command. I had to research it. Forces Net reported on 25 May 22 the assumption of command by Hewitt. A little over 19 months in command is a short stint. The army by comparison have COs in post for typically 30 months (2.5 years), but if a promotion job comes up then a CO can move earlier (or a bit later). Of course Hewitt moves on to a senior staff role – unless he is leaving the Navy. What else would he do? The article does not say if… Read more »
Absolutely, no blame attached to Capt Hewitt and he is following current RN practice, which is similar to USN.
However, in the USN, CVN COs have to be Naval Aviators and have previously commanded an aircraft squadron on a carrier deployment.
Length of tour as CO is typically between 18 and 24 months. But the USN has more carriers and considerably more aircraft squadrons with presumably suitable candidates.
Our balance doesn’t seem right with a plethora of senior officers across all 3 services compared to actual fighting units and equipment.
When you shrink the armed services (as the UK has continuously done for decades) the easiest option is not to recruit. But you are then always left with too many senior officers for the down-sized force level. Basically there is c.5-10 year lag as * level appointments are slowly merged, gapped or removed. There is no easy answer to this without completely destroying interest in the armed forces as a 25-30 year long career for high quality officer candidates. .
Great Britain had more admirals than ships early on; five buried in St Paul’s Deptford graveyard according to one local I met.
Spreading knowledge of carrier operations around as swiftly as possible is good sense in a navy without carriers for a decade.
A longer post I made regarding got binned – me neither. In brief why aim recruitment at a small demographic that has shown little interest in joining up as against the one that created the Royal Navy along with much else three and bit centuries ago?
Rather than targeting the lower ranks to solve the retention problem, they have targeted the senior brass. I wonder how many long term NCO posts can be financed by making half a dozen admirals/rear admirals redundant.
I am convinced that there are no surplus senior officers in the Field Force (to use an army term for convenience).
I doubt there are too many senior officers in Defence Diplomacy posts.
But there are probably too many senior staff roles in corporate MoD.
As an officer in HM Forces a posting was generally 2 years but a senior command appointment was usually 2.5 years. It is a retrograde step for the command tour of a carrier CO to be between 18 and 24 months, especially as it is a very complex command.
I don’t see that the fact that we have only 2 carriers to be that relevant. There are other ships that a Captain RN could command.
I’d rather welcome a full airwing of F35s and trained personnel to keep them flying. To bring this embarrassing Houthi debacle, to a swift and very bloody end. Cluster bombs and napalm have a unique way of striking barbarians where they breed – Tehran.
Alas our Western leaders show a distinct lack of testicular fortitude!
Off Topic:
I purchased Warships international fleet review today (HAs POW carrier as the cover picture) Page 35 article reads:
Ex-British Cold war frigates likely to sail on in the Black sea.
It transpires that Romania has cancelled its deal to purchase 4 Gowind frigates from France due to a lack of cash and may have to upgrade the 2X Type 22s it purchased off the UK. Makes me wonder, will the new British DS offer Bucharest
a couple of ships it has recently taken off strength, including one newly refitted.
It would cost, at least £100m to make Hms Westminster sea worthy to the end of decade.
So cheap sale, and £100m top- up for refit!
Sell them as a fixer-upper to some Middle Eastern country that will promptly fit it with S-400 and Russian radar
Fairly old news – the Romanian Ministry of Defence announced on 8 August 2023 that the Gowind order wouldn’t proceed. Given events in Ukraine, it prioritised the purchase of F-35 fighters over the corvettes, asking for government approval to buy these in November. The T22’s will now either have to sail on well in to the 2030’s – or leave service without direct replacement.