… GFI became NWJ (“No Way José”) after hours of valiant struggle, moving the barge carrying the landing craft wave by wave along Southsea front, with the wind whipping at halliards and a nasty short sea crashing again and again against the slab sides of her barge. She was right there, all ready to be crabbed sideways to her carefully judged landing position on the beach, to roll her onto her road transporter. It was just too tantalizing, but in consultation with his expert engineers, 7074 Project Leader Nick Hewitt of the National Museum of the Royal Navy called it: go back and hope for better weather after daybreak. Now the risk factor had multiplied – because if the second attempt failed, the next tidal conditions were a month away, with Autumn winds anticipated. And that redeployment’s cost? £250,000. Ouch.
FATHER NEPTUNE SAYS NO
16 January 2022
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About Rob
Rob is a TV producer, reporter and camera operator with 30 years of experience at the BBC, Channel 4 and ITN, in news, factual and documentary production. He is a four-time award winner, whose awards include a coveted Royal Television Society award for his work on Channel 4 News. His association with the Maritime Foundation goes back to 1995 when he won the first Desmond Wettern Maritime Media Award for a series of reports that led to a major documentary on the loss of the bulk carrier Derbyshire.