oldbilbo
...
.....And the intercom doesn't work.
Astute Sub grounding 'catalogue of errors'
- Thread starter Twister_Ken
- Start date
.....And the intercom doesn't work.
Grumpybear
Well-Known Member
.....And the intercom doesn't work.
That's the trouble with all this newfangled electrickery. they should have sorted out the design of the voice pipe and fitted the same intercom system used in the S class as a backup.
Possibly so, my point is RN navigators have been pranging capital warships for many years. For the sake of £500 why not equip HMS Astute with a handheld Garmin for those dark damp nights when everything else seems to be going wrong.
Re. Singapore... risking the carrier was worth it. The loss of Singapore was an epoch in our history. So many what-ifs flow from even a 2-month delay.
Grumpybear
Well-Known Member
Maybe, maybe not. Even if Force Z had survived that air attack, it would have had to get through a strong escort to get at the Jap transports, which carried by no means all of their ground troops.
I don't disagree with your point about RN navigators. Adding yet another layer of backup just might have prevented this cockup, but the report suggests to me that this level of confusion badly needed to be exposed, and in the end the actual cost of this incident (setting aside the embarrassment caused) was a lot less than it might have been.
And it's not just the RN with a long track record. How about the formation stranding of, I believe, seven US destroyers on the California coast in the twenties?
In my day, engineers in the RN often referred to their executive brethren(all by definition superior by virtue of their right to sea command, but often of much lower intellectual attainments than even the three E grades required to get into Manadon) as woodentops......
I would be a benign dictator, the British people seem to like benign dictators, how else do we explain Thatcher and Blair? Her Mag is safe, I think she deserves a long holiday in Canada. She can come back when I have fixed everything.So when are you planning to behead the monarch, jonjo?
Our green bereted reverend need not worry, I have him lined up to fill a forthcoming vacancy in Canterbury, the C of E needs more backbone.
maxi77
Well-Known Member
You still don't get it, gear does not prevent people cocking it up, proper drill and procedure does, that is why the drills and procedures are developed. The problem was drill and procedure not gear or knowing where they were.
Just one little thought, just how often are Garmin charts updated, how long from information in till a revised chart is issued. For RN charts urgent corrections can be in the fleet in hours. Take it a step further 40 years ago I was using charts that Mr Garmin has still not seen. So how much better is your Garmin than proper updated charts appropriate for the task in hand.
john_morris_uk
Well-Known Member
When I was in Lambeth Palace a few days ago (how about that for place dropping) the ongoing joke amongst the clergy I met with was whether we were measuring for curtains.
Kukri
Well-Known Member
The RN has done much worse... shortly before this happened, the battleship, working her way up the Bristol Channel in a fog, saw a pilot cutter and hailed her to ask where she was. On being told,"under the lee of Lundy", the battleship said the pilot cutter was wrong, went ahead and...
...after grounding two of her officers rowed a gig to the lighthouse,to get to the phone, and, on being told where they were, told the keepers that they was mistaken, because the lighthouse was Hartland Point - the keepers assured them that they knew which lighthouse they were in charge of.
HMS Montagu became a total loss; nobody in the crew was hurt, except in the pride department.
...after grounding two of her officers rowed a gig to the lighthouse,to get to the phone, and, on being told where they were, told the keepers that they was mistaken, because the lighthouse was Hartland Point - the keepers assured them that they knew which lighthouse they were in charge of.
HMS Montagu became a total loss; nobody in the crew was hurt, except in the pride department.
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wot
Well-Known Member
Now that really did get coffee splurted over my keyboard. I've been chuckling over your financial wizardry and blissful ignorance of the need to have sufficient personnel to train (technically and in readiness for promotion) as well as allowing them to go home occasionally.
The ONLY bit you got correct above is the fact that they are an elite Infantry force. It's obvious from your statement that that you don't know any Royal Marines or that you're in complete disregard of your own safety
btw, the annual budget of the RN is about 7 Billion so so I'll gladly go for a 20 Billion budget.
Beadle
Well-Known Member
"the RN culture has made the marines too nice and soft, they have spent too many hours in front BBC documentary cameras suckling starving babies with formula milk on hurricane wrecked islands. The Army culture would roughen them up plus I would put half a dozen mean ******* Parra officers in at the top to restablished a no surrender worrior culture in the Marines."
I would love to see - in fact I would pay good money to see - you put this proposal in these terms to a bunch of Marines
I would love to see - in fact I would pay good money to see - you put this proposal in these terms to a bunch of Marines
Ex-SolentBoy
Well-Known Member
You can make all the excuses you like but, simply put, people screwed up. You can have as much procedure as you like but as long as it is linear any fool can cause havoc.
Proper procedure allows for, and even assumes that stupid human error will occur. In this case the procedure did not seem to have sufficient layers. The point all the non-military novices are making is that if a non sub qualified numpty had been on board with a Garmin handheld, a loud voice and no career to worry about he, or she, would probably have averted the disaster.
The practice of the military investigating their own screw ups has some merit, as they have made their procedures so complicated that the assumption is that no one outside their sphere can constructively criticise. On the other hand this regime always creates an environment when management and procedure are never to blame, only some poor sod trying his best.
Firing the captain may well be a very stupid idea as well. Its convenient to blame him, but the system may well have let him down. From what I read in the press, it seems that management, politicians, military leaders etc always want to blame someone else than themselves.
Having spent a fortune training the bloke and promoting him, perhaps theY should consider that the system they forced him to adopt may well have been the problem.
Poignard
Well-Known Member
We must all do our bit to help 'our boys'.
During the First World War my grandmother used to knit socks and scarves for the troops on the front line. I would like to perpetuate that worthy tradition, and bring it up to date, by offering to donate a a hand-held Garmin GPS to the Commanding Officer of HMS Astute.
During the First World War my grandmother used to knit socks and scarves for the troops on the front line. I would like to perpetuate that worthy tradition, and bring it up to date, by offering to donate a a hand-held Garmin GPS to the Commanding Officer of HMS Astute.
oldbilbo
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Now THAT's what I call a 'troll'.....
And did you know our very own almost-tame and certainly house-trained GodBotherer could reasonably be called a West Anglican - or Wangl - and insh'allah may soon be called a Nangl....?
That would be the surface fleet budget from memory, I have not looked at the figures for a year or more. Total Uk defence budget is either 38 billion or 43 depending on the source you believe. The RN receives the largest slice of that pie so the total is closer to 20 than 7 billion. I am not sure if the MOD civil servants are funded from a separate budget.
Kukri
Well-Known Member
Much depends on whether, as the Comdems wish us to, you conflate the strategic nuclear deterrent budget with the Navy budget, or not.
pagoda
Well-Known Member
Very few of our number ever have been I/C -or NAV on a sub (?) but a rudimentary look at the chart (paper or electric) simply says -to me anyway- that turn promptly to port after going under the Kyle Bridge does not look very clever. Full stop. Real caution needed.
Not quite applied , technology not quite applied either...
Protocol / chain of command should have been clear, but appears to have been a bit slack.?
Like all internal navel gazing, the outcome of the investigation may not prevent this kind of event happening again, since the application of "LAW" is more about a "documentable finish" than justice or
sensible alternatives.....
What you fail to understand is that people are fallible, your failure of perception on this matter is probably due to the fact you considered yourself the be Royal Navy's most infallible navigator.
No the problem is that the man up to with authority to decide where to aim the sub did not know where he was.
I am not against procedure, I am arguing for a £500 backup to mitigate the affect of failed procedure.
prv
Well-Known Member
I would like to perpetuate that worthy tradition, and bring it up to date, by offering to donate a a hand-held Garmin GPS to the Commanding Officer of HMS Astute.
Wouldn't be totally amazed if some other military outfit had already sent the boat one, by way of a joke.
Pete
Twister_Ken
Well-Known Member
So, the First Sealord is tuned in, and decides Scuttlebutt has got it right - Garmin handhelds are what's needed.
He calls a conference, with the Vice Admiral Procurement, the Rear Admiral Electronics, the Vice Admiral Training, the Rear Admiral UKHO to discuss. They all arrive with their staff and their drivers in Whitehall. Full day spent discussing.
Electronics is sent away to set up a test programme to decide which Garmin model is a) most accurate and b) easiest for a stressed-up OOW to use. Will report in three months when another conference, same players, will consider.
Electronics recommendation is accepted.
UKHO is sent away to consider how to port super-duper top-secret eyes-only hi-def charts to the Garmin platform. Reports back that it can be done, two year lead time. Conference decides to go ahead.
Porting exercise over-runs by a year, due to involvement of Qinetiq.
At the next conference, procurement is sent away to negotiate the Garmin purchase, in special battleship grey cases.
Training is tasked to structure a Garmin-Handheld-Bridge-Crews-For-The-Use-Of training course.
Requests the use of an Ardent-class for realistic training.
Request denied, but a full-scale mock-up of the top of an Ardent sail is commissioned to be built, conveniently close to a knocking shop in Devonport. BAE, Thales and Qinetiq invited to bid. Bid document drawn up, tenders submitted, committee reconvenes 6 months later to consider.
Shocked at prices, contract awarded to Symonvski, Jakovski and Zwolinski (Polska) Builders, completed ahead of schedule, under budget.
First batch of Garmins ordered, for training centre, from Marine Megastore. Whilst awaiting the extended delivery, First Sea Lord retires.
His successor calls for a review of the Garmin programme.
He calls a conference, with the Vice Admiral Procurement, the Rear Admiral Electronics, the Vice Admiral Training, the Rear Admiral UKHO to discuss. They all arrive with their staff and their drivers in Whitehall. Full day spent discussing.
Electronics is sent away to set up a test programme to decide which Garmin model is a) most accurate and b) easiest for a stressed-up OOW to use. Will report in three months when another conference, same players, will consider.
Electronics recommendation is accepted.
UKHO is sent away to consider how to port super-duper top-secret eyes-only hi-def charts to the Garmin platform. Reports back that it can be done, two year lead time. Conference decides to go ahead.
Porting exercise over-runs by a year, due to involvement of Qinetiq.
At the next conference, procurement is sent away to negotiate the Garmin purchase, in special battleship grey cases.
Training is tasked to structure a Garmin-Handheld-Bridge-Crews-For-The-Use-Of training course.
Requests the use of an Ardent-class for realistic training.
Request denied, but a full-scale mock-up of the top of an Ardent sail is commissioned to be built, conveniently close to a knocking shop in Devonport. BAE, Thales and Qinetiq invited to bid. Bid document drawn up, tenders submitted, committee reconvenes 6 months later to consider.
Shocked at prices, contract awarded to Symonvski, Jakovski and Zwolinski (Polska) Builders, completed ahead of schedule, under budget.
First batch of Garmins ordered, for training centre, from Marine Megastore. Whilst awaiting the extended delivery, First Sea Lord retires.
His successor calls for a review of the Garmin programme.
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So true, by now the program cost is £2 million bringing the effective cost of 15 Garmins up to £130k a piece, plus the annual contract to keep the super secret digital charts up to date.
Meanwhile in the alternative reality of jonjo's RN v2.0, Commodore Nato-1 overhears the XO joking about the new sub lieutenant who got lost looking for the RFA during a dark squally night off Pembroke. Next morning he looks at his £ 1/2 billion annual underspend and tells his shoreside civilian purchasing manager to buy 10 Garmins. Savvy PM phones up Garmin UK marketing head and gets 10 freebies dispatched overnight in return for a photo OP and "As used bythe Royal Navy". A month later a bored PO who is also a cycling enthusiast camouflages the Garmin yellow cases with some black handlebar cloth tape. CO approves and posts the reel of cloth tape around the squadron.
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