In the lead up to Navy Days which is taking place from Friday 30th July – Sunday 1st August at Portsmouth Naval Base, we will bring you ‘weekly Wednesday’ updates from those currently serving on board.
Hello Readers! My name is Rob Foster. I’m an Able Seaman in Her Majesty’s Ship Daring. This is my 3rd ship in the Navy which I’ve served in for 6 years now, I joined Daring in January 2009. The same month she entered her homeport of Portsmouth for the very first time.
Daring is different to the other ships I have had. She is modern for a start, and so much more capable. My branch is ‘warfare specialist’ which involves a lot of time in the Ops Room helping to fight the ship by analaysing radars, listening to communications, watching cameras, tracking air and surface contacts and reporting them to the command. At present however, I’m working for the Navigating Officer – Lieutenant Knott, as the Navigator’s Yeoman. It’s my job to make sure that all the charts are up to date for all the areas the ship may go into. Currently the ship is undergoing Operational Sea Training (OST) which is six weeks long. During this time we basically go through every part of our job until ‘the staff’ (the guys who inspect us) are happy that we can do the job to a good standard and asses we are safe to deploy anywhere in the world. This involves long days of hard work but it’s worth it in the end. We’ve just started week two of OST where up to now we have been doing a lot of flying serials – landing and launching the Ship’s helicopter, Officer or the Watch Manoeuvres – driving in close company with 2 other warships and a RAS (replenishment at sea) this is where we took on fuel from an auxiliary vessel whilst underway at sea.
For information about Navy Days 2010, please visit: www.navydaysuk.co.uk
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