HMS Hydra (A144)
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HMS Hydra (Pennant Number A144) was a Royal Navy deep ocean hydrographic survey vessel, the third of the original three of the Hecla class. The ship was laid down on 14 May 1964 at Yarrow Shipbuilders, at Scotstoun on the River Clyde and launched on 14 July 1965 by Mary Lythall, wife of the then Chief Scientist (Royal Navy), Basil W Lythall CB (1919-2001). She was completed and first commissioned on 4 May 1966 and, as the replacement for the survey ship HMS Owen, her commanding officer and many of her ship's company formed the first commission of HMS Hydra. She was decommissioned and sold to the Indonesian navy in 1986 and renamed Dewa Kembar.
[edit] Ship's name and Battle Honours
There have been eight ships of the name Hydra in the Royal Navy, named for the Hydra of Greek Mythology, a serpent with many heads (though nine is generally accepted as standard), the centre one of which was immortal. The monster was overcome and slain by Hercules. The ship's badge of HMS Hydra depicts the monster with seven heads. The ship's motto was Ut Herculis Perseverantia ("Like Hercules Persevere").
[edit] 1960s and 1970s
Her first two years were spent on surveys in the Atlantic Ocean and the west coast of Scotland. She carried out surveys off the west coast of Africa in 1968-1969 and, in 1970-1971 surveys around Malaysia, being detached during that time for disaster relief work off East Pakistan. She returned to the United Kingdom in 1971 via the Panama Canal.
Recommissioned at Chatham on 11 October 1971, she set sail for Singapore via the Cape of Good Hope and spent the next five years carrying out extensive surveys in the south Pacific, without returning to the UK. She was involved in disaster relief off Rodrigues Island, one of the Mascarene Islands, while carrying out surveys in areas near the Solomon Islands, her service there being marked by the issue of a Solomon Islands 45c postage stamp recording the ship's surveying in local waters from April 1972 to September 1973. The ship spent some time in 1972 for rest and recreation in Hong Kong.
Surveys were carried out around Fiji in 1973 and around the Maldives in 1974, returning to the Fiji area for further surveys from 1974-1975. HMS Hydra was surveying the waters around the Seychelles later in 1975 and off Iran, and in the Mediterranean, in 1976 before returning to the United Kingdom. She then underwent a refit at Vosper Thornycroft in Southampton, when her living accommodation was extensively modernised.
HMS Hydra was employed on surveys in the Persian Gulf, off Iran, from 1978-1979.
Leading Seaman (SR) Pete Wooding (1925-2002) joined HMS Hydra in the early 1970s and was a member of the ship's company for some fifteen years, through to the mid-1980s; he was awarded the BEM for his service to the ship.
[edit] Three years in the life of a Royal Navy survey ship 1980-83
[edit] Commercial refit and surveys in home waters 1980-81
HMS Hydra was employed on surveys off the west coast of Scotland in the first half of 1980.
In the summer of 1980, she was taken in hand by Ocean Fleets, a commercial shipyard in Birkenhead for refit, with a depleted ship's company living ashore in lodgings in The Wirral. The ship's company moved on board on 7 November 1980 and, after sea trials and acceptance, finally sailed from Merseyside on 8 December for her home port of Portsmouth, where she arrived on 12 December.
She sailed Portsmouth on 8 January 1981 for "shakedown" and "operational sea training" (OST) in the Portland areas. OST successfully completed, she sailed north late on 21 January in order to resume hydrographic surveys off the west coast of Scotland in the Little Minch, between the Isle of Skye and the Hebrides.
She anchored in Uig Bay, Isle of Skye on 24 January and began landing survey teams. The next day was one of Sabbath observance, so no surveying or helicopter operations took place - common practice on Western Isles surveys. Surveying resumed early on Monday with small naval parties looking after trisponders set up on geodetic control stations, ashore on the Shiant Islands and nearby Quidnish; these continued until breaking off for a visit to the major port of Bristol from 6-10 February, where the ship was alongside the Arnolfini contemporary arts centre in Bristol City Dock (now called Bristol Harbour).
Surveys were resumed on 12 February in the Little Minch, off the Isle of Skye, although very rough weather required the suspension of surveys on 17 February and the ship went to anchor. Seasonal gales are no good for boat surveying and hinder ship surveying, and the ship was again at anchor on 21 February, this time in Loch Snizort, Isle of Skye. Resuming surveys the next day, she recovered the "tidewatcher" (a surveying recorder landed to record tides), and also trisponder parties, before sailing for Loch Fyne to anchor for the night of 23/24 February. Boat surveying started in Loch Fyne the next morning and was completed before sailing for, and arriving at, the naval base at Faslane, Helensburgh on 25 February.
The security of the submarine base allowed the ship to grant many of the ship's company long weekend leave, many travelling to Portsmouth to see their families. As much of the surveying work in the Hebrides was done with submarines in mind, the period alongside in the naval base was useful for liaison between the officers and men of the Hydrographic Service and their submariner counterparts. The ship sailed on 12 March for Rona, anchoring in the Little Minch on 13 March. The next day, surveys resumed between Skye and the Shiant Islands. Surveys were concluded, trisponder parties and the sole tidewatcher recovered on 22 March, the ship sailing south the next day for her base port of Portsmouth, where she arrived on 24 March for maintenance and Easter leave.
HMS Hydra locked into number 3 basin on 27 March and, on 2 April, moved into number 15 dock for a routine dry-docking. Leave and maintenance completed, she sailed from Portsmouth on 27 April to resume Scottish surveys in the Minches, with a week's work to do; the night of 29/30 April was spent at anchor in Uig Bay and the ship was at anchor in Loch Flodabay, on the east coast of Harris on 3 May.
The next task was to the west of the Hebrides; this was a re-survey of an area done about a century previously, between the Monach Islands and the island of St Kilda. By 6 May the ship was surveying two-mile lines, in the area to the west of Benbecula, on North Uist, to the south of the Monach Islands in the Outer Hebrides.
The ship broke off surveys and sailed south for a visit to the Isle of Man on 13 May 1981 arriving alongside in Douglas, Isle of Man the next day. She sailed 18 May, conducting a trial near Ailsa Craig, while on passage to the survey ground off the Monach Islands, arriving the next day. On 28 May she was anchored in Village Bay, Hirta - the largest of the four islands that make up St Kilda - allowing a walk ashore for some of the ship's company on the island, uninhabited since the last native St Kildans were evacuated in 1930; since 1957, there has been a manned military radar tracking station on the island. Weighing anchor the next morning, the ship resumed surveys.
She broke off surveys on 3 June and sailed for Bootle in Merseyside. The ship arrived alongside in Gladstone Dock two days later. Long weekend leave was granted and routine self-maintenance undertaken. Those on board, but not on duty in the evening or at weekends, were able to enjoy a "run ashore" in Bootle or Liverpool. HMS Hydra sailed Bootle on 15 June for the Outer Hebrides in order to resume surveys.
She broke off surveys and, after a passage south through the Sound of Mull on 1 July, she arrived alongside Greenock Pier, on the River Clyde on 2 July, granting weekend leave to the ship's company. She sailed Greenock on 6 July, returning to the Outer Hebrides survey area, before returning once more to Greenock Pier (16-20 July) and then, again, resuming surveys.
On 27 July the ship hoisted the flag of the Hydrographer of the Navy, (Rear-Admiral David Haslam), when he arrived by the ship's Westland Wasp helicopter. Scottish surveys were completed for the summer, and the ship headed south the next day for its home port, Portsmouth. The summer proved to be one of the wettest on record and this seriously detracted from the ship's ability to control its soundings by trisponder. In other respects, the weather was reasonably kind and boat work was possible for about half the duration of the survey.
The Hydrographer flew ashore early on the morning of Wednesday 29 July 1981. The ship, on passage south through the Irish Sea, changed to "Sunday routine" so that the ship's company could take part in the national public holiday for the wedding of HRH the Prince of Wales and the Lady Diana Spencer; adequate television pictures and a barbecue on the flight deck!
Arriving in Spithead on 31 July, the ship held a "Families’ Day" at sea, off Portsmouth, before securing alongside in the naval base, for summer leave and maintenance. Moved into C Lock on 3 August, the ship stayed locked in for a month, being moved to the sea wall on 2 September, before a "cold move" outboard of the frigate, HMS Lowestoft, the next day.
[edit] To West Africa and surveys in the Caribbean 1981-82
Newly fitted with a leased Sercel Syledis positioning system for evaluation, she sailed on 7 September 1981 to conduct surveys in the Caribbean Sea, surveying the Josephine Bank and the Ampere Bank on 11 and 13 September, as well as investigating "vigia 4", "vigia 7" and "vigia 23". With a maximum speed of 14 knots using all three engines, when the starboard engine was lost on 21 September, the ship was limited to 11 knots for the rest of the deployment.
She arrived Dakar, Senegal for a visit from 24-28 September 1981. On leaving Dakar, the ship was directed to Banjul, capital of The Gambia, on 29 September in order to locate a ditched Senegalese Puma helicopter, which had crashed into the river while landing Senegalese troops during the attempted coup d'état, on 1 August 1981, in the Gambia. Using copies of a recent survey, by sister ship HMS Hecla flown to Dakar from the UK Hydrographic Office, in Taunton, HMS Hydra's two surveying motor boats began sounding and sonar sweeping and located the ditched machine, the local port authority marking the helicopter's position with a float. She sailed the next day.
She arrived Lagos, Nigeria, on 5 October 1981, in company with the destroyer USS Conyngham (DDG 17), which she had met, by chance, in fog outside the entrance to the port. She sailed Lagos on 9 October and set course south, to pick up the equatorial current across the Atlantic Ocean at 1½°N - with fine weather and calm seas - passing north of St Peter and St Paul Rocks on 16 October, arriving Bridgetown, Barbados, for a visit from 23-27 October.
She was alongside at the US Naval Station at Roosevelt Roads, Puerto Rico from 29-31 October before setting up camps and sites on Great Inagua and the Turks Islands, in order to carry out hydrographic surveys centred on the waters around the British Virgin Islands. These surveys were part of a project in co-operation with the United States Navy, in the Turks and Caicos Islands, covering the Mouchoir Passage and Turks Island Passage. These passages were last surveyed by Commander Richard Owen in HMS Blossom in 1829.
Visits were made to Roadtown, Tortola from 12-16 November and, after sailing, a rendezvous was made with the RFA Stromness near Vieques to take on stores, before resuming surveys. On 2 December, she broke off from surveys to visit Nassau, Bahamas from 4-8 December 1981 and she then continued surveying (Hydrographic Instruction - HI 54) until 15 December. Changes were found in the configuration of the reefs - the northern edge of the Mouchoir Bank being nearly two miles south of its charted position.
Leaving a handful of volunteers to guard the various sites on island shores, she sailed north in order to spend two weeks alongside in St Petersburg, Florida, arriving 18 December, for Christmas and New Year 1981/1982. The city's people gave the sailors a very generous welcome. Sailing on 2 January 1982, she arrived on the survey ground four days later and recovered the landed sailors, after their lonely three weeks in the sun.
Hydrographic Instruction "HI 54" was completed by 15 January 1982 and equipment ashore recovered. At anchor overnight on 15/16 January, she sailed for Roosevelt Roads arriving 18 January. She sailed three days later for Sand Cay in order to set up the surveys in the BVI area; time off task was necessitated by the ship being ordered to co-orinate a search and rescue operation for a woman lost overboard from a yacht; the search was called off at sunset without finding her. 21-22 January was spent in Road Town, Tortola and then hydrographic surveys began, anchoring overnight 22/23 January off Beef Island, before setting up the boat camp and trisponder station on Guana Island and "bottoming" overnight. Hydrographic surveys continued in the BVI, including a detached boat camp in West Anegada, until completion on 8 February, anchoring that night in Cane Garden Bay, Tortola.
A visit was made to St. John's, on the island of Antigua, from 9-13 February, before passage east across the Atlantic Ocean. 21-22 February was spent surveying the Atlantic Seamount, 400 miles SW of the Azores, completing with a visit to Ponta Delgada, the island's capital, on 25-26 February. At anchor off Swanage, and later in Spithead on 3 March, she returned 'home' to Portsmouth Naval Base on 4 March 1982.
[edit] The Falklands War of 1982 (Operation Corporate)
March was spent in the naval base, the ship undergoing assisted maintenance and the ship's company taking leave. The ship's programme for more surveys off the west coast of Scotland in the summer of 1982 was changed by Argentina's invasion of the Falkland Islands in April 1982. HMS Hydra was converted in Portsmouth Naval Base for service as a Hospital ship - a replenishment at sea position was fitted, the yellow funnel painted white and red crosses painted prominently, and the starboard engine replaced - and she sailed on 24 April 1982, in company with her sister-ship HMS Herald, with additional medical staff, for the South Atlantic. Her journey south took four weeks, crossing the line on 6 May (although the traditional ceremony was held the previous day, for operational reasons). She was a short time in the anchorage off Ascension Island for replenishment on 8 May. She was at position 35ºS 35ºW on 15 May and 45ºS 47ºW on 18 May. HMS Hydra joined sister ship HMS Hecla and SS Uganda, in the "Red Cross Box" (48º 30’S 53º 45’W ), about 45 miles north of Falkland Sound on 19 May.
A rendezvous was made on 25 May 1982 with the requisitioned P&O liner, the troopship SS Canberra, and the MV Norland, in order to transfer casualties. The day after she arrived in "Red Cross Box 2" – at position 50º 50’S 58º 40’W on 30 May 82, she embarked 49 casualties from Uganda. Underway the next day, 2 June 1982, on passage for Montevideo, she undertook the ship's first-ever replenishment at sea - a RAS(L) - with the oiler RFA Olmeda, in order to take on fuel. The ship arrived in the River Plate on 6 June, disembarking her patients in the full glare of the world's media, eager for news and photographs. She sailed south at 2200 the same day.
The pattern of casualty evacuation was thus established, HMS Hydra worked with her two sister ships, HMS Hecla and 'HMS Herald,to take casualties from the main hospital ship Uganda, operating in the declared "Red Cross Box", to Montevideo, Uruguay, where they were disembarked by a fleet of Uruguayan ambulances and flown by RAF VC10 aircraft to the UK for transfer to the Princess Alexandra Royal Air Force Hospital at Wroughton, near Swindon. The hospital ship HMS Hydra made four such passages from the waters off the Falkland Islands to Montevideo, carrying a total of 251 British military casualties, many of them burns victims after the air attacks on landing ships at Bluff Cove. The last three 'lifts' of patients were made with departures from Grantham Sound, in the Falkland Islands, to Montevideo on 14 June with 80 casualties, 24 June with 66 casualties and, finally, on 7 July 1982 with 48 casaulties. Thirty of the ship's company had been trained, during the passage south. to support the medical staff as temporary nurses - many were called on for that assistance. Inspections to ensure compliance with International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) conditions were carried out by ICRC staff, some transferring to the ship in an Argentinian hospital ship aircraft on 12 June. An inspection was also made by Argentinian naval officers in the estuary of the River Plate.
After the surrender, to Royal Marines Major-General Jeremy Moore, of the Argentinian occupying forces on 14 June 1982, HMS Hydra stayed behind as the Falkland Islands Hospital Ship, based in Port Stanley, until the airport runway was repaired and extended. After her last journey to Uruguay, she returned south and went to anchor in Port William, Falkland Islands, on 17 July. The next day she weighed anchor and sailed into Port Stanley, to anchor near the damaged RFA Sir Tristam, spending a week in the harbour, undergoing self-maintenance.
She later visited most of the major settlements, providing transport for a civilian doctor to visit the scattered population, and was at Fox Bay from 15 to 17 August. She finally left Port Stanley on 27 August 1982, calling at Ascension Island on 9 September 1982, disembarking an advance leave party to fly home ahead of the ship. She was the last unit of the original Operation Corporate Task Force to return to the UK, arriving to an extraordinary welcome in Portsmouth on 24 September 1982. She was then converted back to her survey fleet role and resumed surveys in UK waters later in the year. Meanwhile, the ship's company went on leave, having been away from home waters for eleven of the past twelve months.
HMS Hydra thus added a seventh Battle Honour - South Atlantic 1982 - to her name.
(The 25th anniversary of the Falklands War falls in 2007 and there are a number of events being planned for June 2007 - see [1]) and [[2]]
[edit] United Kingdom waters 1982-83
HMS Hydra, freshly painted in her survey livery and with a large number of new faces among her 120 men, sailed Portsmouth on 25 November 1982 for surveys in the Western Approaches. At first it was too rough to start surveying, so the ship anchored off Scalasaig, Colonsay, on 28 November and weighed anchor to resume surveying the next day; after calibration of the Hyperfix chain being used for positional control, the sonar sweep and sounding began.
She broke off surveying and set passage to Greenock on 5 December, arriving alongside Greenock Pier the next day. She sailed out of the River Clyde on 8 December, and was east of Jura the following day, having resumed surveys. She broke off surveying on 13 December and sailed south for Portsmouth, securing outboard of the Tribal class frigate HMS Zulu on 16 December 1982, before granting Christmas leave to the majority of the ship's company. Despite the interruptions due to bad weather, 250 square miles of surveying were completed in the three weeks on task.
She sailed Portsmouth five days into the New Year and arrived on the survey ground, off the west coast of Scotland, on 7 January 1983, but surveying proved difficult owing to rough weather; the survey area was about 30 miles north of the aptly-named Bloody Foreland in the NW of Ireland. She was off Jura on 8 January and made passage through the Sound of Islay on 10 January. She broke off surveying on 13 January and set passage to the River Clyde, arriving alongside Greenock Pier a day later, sailing again for the survey ground on 17 January.
She passed round the Mull of Kintyre to the Sound of Jura on 18 January and resumed surveys the next day. Very rough weather forced the ship to shelter behind the island of Inishtrahull on 20 January, so little progress had been made before she broke off from surveys and sailed for Belgium on 26 January. She was on passage through the Irish Sea the next day and arrived alongside in Antwerp on 31 January for a four-day visit. She arrived back in Portsmouth, her home port, on 5 February 1983 for a scheduled docking and repairs to defects. She moved into dry dock, and was docked down from 15-23 February, the dock being flooded up on 24 February.
HMS Hydra returned to sea on Monday 25 April 1983, for a brief trials and shakedown cruise prior to a week's Safety Operational Sea Training (SOST) at the Portland Naval Base, from 17-25 May. On completion of SOST, specialist equipment and trials personnel were embarked from the Admiralty Underwater Weapons Establishment (AUWE), Portland, for an oceanographic trials cruise which lasted until July. At the same time, the prototype Depth Analysis System developed at the Admiralty Compass Observatory was installed on the bridge, and trials staff embarked to conduct a short trial while on passage to Scotland.
For information about the Survey Ships Association, see [3]
[edit] Commanding Officers
- Commander John Paton RN - 1966-196?
- Commander Michael J Baker RN - 1969-1971?
- Commander Roger O Morris RN †† (CB 1990?) - 1971-1973
- Captain R Chester Read RN § (CBE 1982?) - 1973-1975
- Commander Richard J Campbell RN § - 1975-1977
- Commander/Captain ? - 1977- January 1980
- Commander Richard J Campbell RN § (OBE 1983) - January 1980 - October 1982
- Commander David C B Webb RN - October 1982-1984
- Commander Charles F Heron-Watson RN - 1984-1986
Commanding officers from 1966 were qualified in Hydrographic Surveying (Charge Grade) †† Promoted to Rear-Admiral 28 January 1985 and appointed Hydrographer of the Navy
§ Qualified Royal Navy submariner, transferring later to the Hydrographic Service
From September 1981, her ship's company of 120 changed little for a year, notably the addition of wartime medical staff in April 1982. All the ship's company involved in Operation Corporate in 1982 were awarded the South Atlantic Medal engraved with the ship's name.
see List of ships complement of HMS Hydra (A144)
[edit] See also
- For other ships of this name see : HMS Hydra.
[edit] further reading
"Report by the Hydrographer of the Navy" for the years 1981, 1982 and 1983. See also the UK Hydrographic Office website at [4]
| Hecla class survey ship |
| Hecla | Hecate | Hydra | Herald |
List of survey vessels of the Royal Navy |
