Spurred on by Daves excellent post about WWII coastal defences I thought a dip into the history books was in order, it’s been some time since I did anything on matters of ‘yesterday’ but there are so many worthy subjects its hard to decide what to cover.
Having read this post at Snafu the subject of merchant ships being used in military operations and specifically, the Atlantic Conveyor, seemed a good one to cover.
The Atlantic Conveyor was built on the Tyne by Swan Hunter and delivered to Cunard in 1970 as part of their contribution to the Atlantic Container Line consortium.
UPDATE
I have updated this document and republished it at the link below
http://www.thinkdefence.co.uk/2012/04/the-atlantic-conveyor-falklands30/
The story of the partially Treasury funded replacements for Atlantic C’s is an interesting one.
Ahh! Falklands war History is still fascinating no matter how much you already know about the subject there is always that little bit more.
Btw Admin have you seen this site before http://www.naval-history.net/FpxAAscension.htm if not it’s definitely worth a look.
Thanks Euan, yes, its an absorbing subject, maybe because its so recent but not quite current
No first hand knowledge, but some anecdotes (no names to protect the “innocent” and all that). My Communications Yeoman (CY) at HMS Mercury (Yeoman being a Petty Officer in Tactical Comms) was the CY on the Atlantic Conveyor. He was not, erm, “completely recovered” from his ordeal, when he was our instructor in the summer of 83. The story was that he ended up in the water, was winched up to a Seaking where, due the freezing temperatures they mistook him for dead and put him in a body bag. Apparently he warmed up and awoke inside said body bag, with a couple of other DB’s stacked on top of him…… IF it is true, it would explain a lot about his behaviour ! (Make our class run round the crescent road at Mercury in fearnought suites and breathing apparatus for example)
Also the First Mate of the tug Irishman is a best mate of my dad and a personal friend of mine, they did make some herculean efforts to get her, and keep her under tow.
Excellent article – certainly brought back a few memories for me! 54 merchant ships were taken up from trade (STUFT) to assist the armed forces during the South Atlantic conflict. 43 sailed for the South Atlantic with Merchant Navy crews and Naval Parties embarked, before the Argentine surrender on 15th June.
The Board of Inquiry report into the loss, for those interested in reading such things:
http://www.mod.uk/NR/rdonlyres/EC14467A-DFAF-4030-BDFB-9E1AAF00205E/0/boi_atlanticconveyorpt1.pdf
http://www.mod.uk/NR/rdonlyres/A2B1A9E9-9EF1-413A-979C-A90C6507DBD4/0/boi_atlanticconveyorpt2.pdf
Hi Nick
I was anxious to do the subject justice so thanks for stopping by, for your kind words and the correction on the number of ships (I will change the body of the article).
Have linked to your site as well and for those that might not notice it on the blogroll
http://www.nickmessinger.co.uk/
Once again, thank you
Thanks Fincher and welcome to Think Defence
I was under the impression that the Exocets were targeting the frigates, and when they fired their chaff the missiles followed their design by looking for another target and found the Conveyor. Your article makes it sound like the missiles were always targeting the Conveyor and they frigates fired their chaff to defend the Conveyor–and failed–rather than firing the chaff to protect themselves, and succeeding. Do you know which account is accurate?
Hi JS, I think they were targeting the carriers but with that many vessels in the area and the unpredictability of what happens with chaff clouds about I am not sure the exact sequence, perhaps some more reading is in order
It’s ironic, I think that the pilots were looking for the carriers, but fired at the first large radar contact they encountered–the frigates. The exocets were then targeting the frigates, but were confused by the chaff and found the Conveyor instead. Nothing was looking for the Conveyor, neither the pilots nor the exocets, but that is what got hit.
Perhaps by way of historical extension, you might post comments about the two USMC Aviation Support Ships (T-AVB) under MSC control.
http://www.msc.navy.mil/inventory/ships.asp?ship=78
And of course this thread also relates to the Maersk proposal to convert one of it S-class very large containers ships to be an AFSB for joint US use.
It is interesting that the Arapaho conccept has never been fully tested i.e on a large container ship with all container cells converted??
P.S. the historical prececedent to all of the above are the T-AKV aircraft transports which were MSC civilian crewed WW2 CVEs.
Yet another excellent post. I thought I knew about the Atlantic Conveyor but didn’t realise she was part RO-RO.
A interesting article (memo to self: find new way to describe links) which relates to the above post and involves TD’s favourite topic (containers, like you didn’t guess).
http://thedignifiedrant.blogspot.com/2009/12/forward-to-thousand-ship-american-navy.html
Intended for USN, but I think of universal utility. Could they be candidates for Forward Presence ships, Humanitarian Assistance,”Escort Carriers”, etc?
thanks gareth
JS
Its my understanding that the Argentine Command Staff was targeting the carriers specificaly, however from what I’ve read, the pilots fired on the first/biggest radar contact they picked up.
Frigates on Forward Picket would be seen by radar long before the much larger carriers and the Atlantic Conveyer isnt far from the right size, and shape even.
Having never fired an anti ship missile, I cant be sure, but from what I know of earlier missiles, they simply aimed for the centre of a target.
Happily flying between two frigates they’ve mistook for a single large ship.
Theres no reason a missile couldnt aim for the centre of a “frigate”, continue to aim for the centre of a frigate/chaff cloud, miss the frigate, fly through the chaff and out the other end pick up the next ship and hit that.
Interesting Link Euan, especialy the USAF flight engineer who absolutly did not drop off any Shrikes….
IIRC from Woodward’s memoir, the fleet was disposed with three successive lines of ships along the threat axis – the T42 destroyers forming the outer radar picket, a line of T21 and Leander frigates behind them, and finally a line of RFAs and merchantmen with the T22 goalkeeper just behind them, before you got to the carriers.
You could see this as putting the high value assets in general deep inside the defence, or as putting as many long, thin radar returns between the carriers and the enemy as possible. In practice both views would have been accurate as Conveyor was the only big ship lost with the carrier group and the carriers never got hit.
P.S. the historical prececedent to all of the above are the T-AKV aircraft transports which were MSC civilian crewed WW2 CVEs.
My grandfather sailed in the same escort group as the original escort carrier herself, HMS Audacity, on the trip to Gibraltar.
A similar idea to the link I posted earlier, for “Auxiliary” cruisers.
http://brickmuppet.mee.nu/weaponsnkit/archive/2009/3
The conveyer was with us as we had been cross decking harriers and kit all day.I can remember the action station alarm going off and the urgency in the voice of the person sounding the alarm and we knew it was close.
When I closed up to my action station Igot kitted up I opened the weather deck access door for a peak to see what was happening.I could see her clearly ablaze especially around the super structure lads running up and down the deck donning there once only survival suits and going over the side as she was that close to us.
Then all the helicopters started closing in on her and winching up the lads out of the water and from the liferafts.
I knew several of the lads who were on her and they were brought over to us.It seemed quite funny at the time in a starnge way and we were takiung the piss out of them(gallows humour I suppose)then I can remember looking at them and seeing the shock in there eyes and the reality of what had just happened to them sank in.
Had she not taken the hit would it have taken us ?
Thanks for commenting Hermes82, welcome to Think Defence
I was embarked on the Conveyor (848 NAS) at this time .
There has always been a debate as to whether we were hit by one or two missiles – it doesn’t really matter I guess , despite gallant efforts there was nothing we could do to save her .
The lone question I have always carried with me is , if she was so important to the success of the landings , why weren’t we better protected ?
Hope you liked the post
Hi Peter, welcome to Think Defence
I always think what would have happened if the ship had not been sunk, what difference would it have made to the campaign, especially the helicopters influence on the need to disembark 5th Infantry Brigade at Bluff Cove
Indeed .
Have just read N.P 1840 The Loss of the Atlantic Conveyor . Wish I hadn’t , the author (Snr 3rd Engineer on board) has a completely different recall of events from sailing to returning than I have – especially his (somewhat biased) views on the capabilities etc between the MN and RN .
at no stage did I witness anything other than complete professionalism during the voyage and taking into account we were flying non stop throughout AND having to undertake fire watches , little sleep was achieved (esp by 848) . Abandon Ship was conducted without panic – he suggests a certain degree of disorder and lack of understanding during this period – no so . I don’t wish to go into detail , the author needed some self promotion in order to sell books I guess .
He also listed two deceased colleagues (848 NAS) as “Writers” and included a photo of the Alacrity – unfortunately , it was the 1950′s Alacrity (F60)
Tengan en cuenta , que en futuro vamos de nuevo a recuperar nuestras islas malvinas , con la ayuda de brasil , venezuela , y los rafale de francia . En la guerra de malvinas del 82 la “gran potencia britanica” casi pierde la guerra con un pais de inferioridad tecnologica, gran cantidades de buques hundidos , un secreto de guerra de 90 años , que secreto tiene que esconder , la gran cantidad de muertos , el exocet que le pegaron al portaviones invencible… , etc, ustedes son un desastre sin estados unidos no son nada , manga de decadentes.
or roughly translated, we are going to get the malvinas back
“ustedes”
I always like saying that in Spanish class. OO-sted-sss Rolls off the tongue in exactly the same way Welsh doesn’t mostly.
@ pepelola
Desaparecen o una bayoneta hasta el fondo!
(Yes I know there should be an inverted exclamation mark at the beginning of that but I don’t feel he is worth the effort.)
I always wonder if The Indian Times is plagued by little British boys proclaiming we’ll have them back eventualy.
hang on pepe i’ll just check that out for ya. nope still a hole in my arse
Where did this myth of sinking Invincible instead of Atlantic Conveyor come from?
@ paul g
Aren’t you glad they aren’t designed by BAE to fulfil an MoD contract?
@ Topman
The same place that told the poor Argentine conscripts that the Falklanders wanted to be liberated as they were being brutally oppressed by the vicious British Empire…..
The last I heard about the sinking of the Invincible conspiracy it was about an interview with a Sky Hawk pilot who claimed that he overflew a smoking hulk with an aircraft landing deck a bit like a carrier. It then goes on to claim that the British had the US build a new 20,000tonne ship with complement of 800-odd with absolutely no-one noticing and in time to steam back to the UK (Or Illustrious was doing a stint as an impressionist despite a picture of them steaming alongside each other)
If memory serves the Invincible was sunk several times by the Argentines. One Argentine who found himself aboard Invincible refused to believe it..
Didn’t they also believe the Gurkhas were cannibals?
Yeah I think I read that they thought an extra CVS was built abroad so the ‘sinking’ could be covered up.
Hola britanicos , estamos apostando al futuro a la ciencia y tecnologia en argentina , en el area nuclear , defenza , etc asi cuando toda europa se hunda economicamente y se caiga a pedazos , y le volvermos a hacer la guerra y recuperaremos nuestras islas malvinas.Ustedes sin EEUU no son nada , no tienen ni portaviones ,que verguenza la gran flota britanica.me pregunto ¿por que el secreto de 90 años de malvinas?.que tienen que esconder todos los muertos que escondieron , la perdida del invencible.
@ pepelola
Vete a Groucho poco tedioso.
Hola britanicos , estamos apostando en el futuro a la ciencia y tecnologia en argentina , en el area nuclear , defenza , etc asi cuando toda europa se hunda economicamente y se caiga a pedazos , y le volvermos a hacer la guerra y recuperaremos nuestras islas malvinas.Ustedes sin EEUU no son nada , no tienen portaviones ,que verguenza la gran flota britanica.me pregunto por que el secreto de 90 años de malvinas.que tienen que esconder.
@ pepelola
boludo……
Great article think defence. I was sreading the rotors of the Wessex 5 just aft of the forward flight deck when we were hit. A scary time for a young 19 year old, but recently my mind has been blown away by a fact that I read in the “Board of Enquiry” of the sinking of the AC. I was rescued by a Wessex 5 of 845 squadron “YD” XT459. I didn’t know this until last week when I read the report. In December 1983, I was on operation “Clockwork” in northern Norway, left hand seat in “YD” when we spiralled in nose first from 1200ft. I’m in shock that the same aircraft rescued me, then 19 months later nearly killed me!
Thanks Phil, welcome to Think Defence
That’s a cracking story, its these little details that are so easily lost
i was on the Alacrity at the time we had detected the etendards and had fired chaff resulting in the conveyor being hit. we spent the next few hours first tied up alongside trying to firefight and rescue survivors but it was too rough and we were getting smashed together. we then stood off and put swimmers in to rescue survivors and recover some of those less fortunate. there is a 30 year memorial service at the pierhead liverpool on the 25/5/12 if anybody is interested.
Welcome to TD Stevey, thanks for the comment
Once again a Tory Government, bad feelings about,
But could we do it again, or to many cuts???
Have we got a Iron Man in charge, or Mr Jelly Man!!!!
We can only hope that there is a Nelson in the Navy.
Hi….Was serving aboard HMS Alacrity at the time. As i recall the exocet(s) were aimed at us and /or the carriers, but we sent up loads of chaff which confused the missile(s), which carried on past us and then, as programmed, they hunted for the next large object which happened to be Atlantic Conveyor, about a mile away from us ?…Alacrity was first alongside, and as Stevey correctly stated, it was far too rough for us to stay alonside for long, especially as it turned out that the Alacrity’s hull was already in poor condition due to the battering it took down south. I recall vividly hauling some bodies on board, we had nowhere to store them, so we had to temporarily stow them in one of our ammunition stores….It was another terrible day, coming only four and two days after losing two of our sisters, Ardent and Antelope respectively….Morale was pretty low for a time..Dave “Bungy” Williams WEM(R)1…
One other thing, really cheesed off about the pictures of HMS Alacrity in the book “NP1840 The Loss of the Atlantic Conveyor”, showing pictures of the wrong HMS Alacrity. (It shows our predecessor, a 1950′s model)…lack of research and respect I think…
On a more current geopolitical note as started by pepelola, I estimate that they’ll get the “Maldives” back soon.
It’s the next thing on the list, right after “Hell freezes over.”
@pepelola: the fact you couldn’t be bothered to attempt to speak English to those that speak it says your chances of recovering the “Malvinas” are absolutely fuck all
google translate,
Hello British, are betting on the future science and technology in argentina, in the nuclear area, defence, etc. so when across Europe will collapse economically, and fall to pieces, and you volvermos to make war and recover our malvinas Islands.Without us you are nothing, they do not have the large fleet aircraft carrier, what a shame britanica.me wonder that the secret of 90 years of malvinas.que have to hide
paul translate,
we talk a lot, having nothing to show for it, one day we will rule the world mwhuh ha ha!! (twat)
How do I ask him if his President is dating again?
@wf
Which one? They go by so quickly.
I was embarked upon AC having cross-decked from HMS Hermes on 20th May with B Flight 845 NAS. I too have read the book ‘The Loss of Naval Party 1840′ and are disappointed by some of the comments earlier in this thread. I am not saying the recollections of Charles are correct or otherwise but unless you were looking through his eyes at everything he witnessed or interpreted how could you possibly comment? Were you in the engine room etc…..no…..then you cannot comment. I personally saw no panic when the order to abandon ship came but that does not mean it did not manifest itself elsewhere on board, just that I did not witness it. I recall being instructed to write an account of our experience, on the passage back to Ascension Island, of the time between the missiles striking and abandoning ship. The only remit was that you could only write what you saw with your own eyes, not hearsay, not what your oppo told you they saw and I have no doubt that Charles Drought has done just that. I have met the author on a few occasions and he is a fine and honourable man. My memories of the event are personal to me, as are everyones and he is no exception.