Falkland Islands Deployment

I've been a little lethargic and slow recently, hence the lack of photos. For the second time on deployment I've felt like I'm 8000 miles from home. I think the weather hasn't helped- we're over the winter down here, but spring is just damp and cold, and the sea conditions are sometimes terrible. The other night was quite funny, it was just starting to get rough as we travelled round to the north of the Falklands, with people starting to feel queasy, and then all of a sudden the ship seemed to just fall off a cliff- You suddenly get that light-stomach feeling you get when free-falling on a theme-park ride... and then BOOM! The whole ship shook, with a loud bang. You can't help but instantly worry that you might hear "Hands To Emergency Stations, Hands to Emergency Stations!"- but that's just paranoia- you know it's just the weather! For good measure though, the evening's film broadcast was "The Perfect Storm"!

So after a good half an hour of poor conditions I decided to go up to the bridge with my camera, and the officer of the watch gave me permission to take some photos. Unfortunately the windows were steamy, so these images are poor quality, but you can see exactly what happens, and why it feels like we're falling off a cliff. The top photo shows us approaching a very big wave, not going too fast, but you can see the wave is a good 30-50ft high, almost coming above the forecastle.
The photo on the left here is the ship riding up it, and at this point most of the forecastle is out of the water as the balance of the ship goes over the crest.... And then the bottom photo is the forecastle plummeting down, the very front of it falling somewhere between 70-100ft, hitting the water, creating the kind of walls of water that makes me think of a certain water divide in the old testament in the bible... but I don't think Moses' staff had over 5000 tonnes of displacement....
Pretty epic?

So that was just a couple of days ago. Those conditions were "Sea State 6"- but the swell of the waves were huge. It's quite fun when you're on the bridge I think. But everywhere else onboard you just feel ill! And it wasn't long after that that the command made a decision to head back round to the south of the Falklands to get some shelter and anchor for the night.

Anyway, going back a few weeks, we had a couple of nights back in Stanley, managed to pick up some more memorabilia and have an absolutely DELICIOUS meal out at the Stanley Brasserie... that's me there eating some spicy chicken skewers and couscous... and the T-shirt is my first birthday present of the month! Thanks Madeleine! Just about THE most applicable T-shirt for my reputation at the moment!

And er, Doc's posing in the wellies that me and him both bought for an extortionate price. But they are the best wellies in the world, really grippy, and they're thermal insulated down to -40degC. Apparently. This photo below is from out the back of Stanley, you can see our ship anchored just in the mist. And I have to say, where on earth is a red double-decker bus going to be used in Stanley?

Someone had an old mobile artillary gun that may well have been used back in 1982. Doc couldn't hotwire it unfortunately. So it's back out to sea. That's where we are now, that's where we've been for quite a few days now, whether at anchor or sailing or on exercise or on patrol, my job is the same. Same old, same old.

Apparently next week we're going to be doing a firing exercise with the 4.5" gun- bombarding a land target... and apparently some hooligans from the army are going to be advancing on the target, somewhere between our ship, and the er... target we're firing at!?!? Madness. Some people are quite simply harder than me. And after all that, our ship has to get used to fighting Typhoons (see my last blog entry)... I don't know anything about warfare, but I am pretty sure that no amount of practice is going to allow us to defeat those badboys. I just hope that everyone who owns a typhoon has a good heart...

So if you wondered what sort of mood this blog is being written in, let the photo below convey all of my emotion. That's Gary there by the way. I call him Garibaldi. He prefers me to call him PO Garibaldi. I think I've watched too many chic-flics & heartbreakers recently. Australia, Pretty Woman and The Notebook already this week. Dear me, I need to reset myself.