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So… what of the ship herself? She may not have been built to impress but she certainly does. Constructed by Daewoo Shipbuilding & Marine Engineering in Korea, she took just 3 years from laid down to sea trials – British shipbuilders please note –a good example of the benefits of getting away from obsessively building all RN assets here. Which means endless delay as we don’t have the shipyards any more. Another advantage of getting South Korea to do may have been to head off the endless faffing about by the MoD, changing the design of doorknobs (only half kidding) and insisting on mods like the newest, fanciest kit. That all meant order to in-service was just 5 years. Hmm. There are 4 in the ’Tide’ class – ‘Tiderace’, Tidesurge’ and ‘Tideforce’. Max speed 20 knots. Range 18,200 nautical miles. Very nice.

This would be Andy Jones’ and my home for the best part of a week, in a voyage from Plymouth to Scotland. RFA ‘Tidespring’ is one of the newest fleet support ships the Royal Navy can call on. She’s equipped to deliver whatever’s needed:
above all, fuel. Essential for the new super-carriers, whose designers opted for conventional fuel for her propulsion system – turbines feeding electric motors. Nuclear propulsion was rejected due to its high cost and manpower required, in favour of ‘Integrated Electric Propulsion’ – with two Rolls-Royce Marine Trent gas turbine generator units and four Wärtsilä diesel generator sets (two at 9 megawatts delivering 12,000 horse power, two at 11 megawatts delivering 15,000 horsepower.) All of that needs engineers. So does the RFA – with a catch: though it’s a civilian service, all crew members must be UK citizens.

Next stop for our Merchant Navy Training Board project: the Royal Fleet Auxiliary. Half navy and half not, manned by merchant seafarers, the RFA is vital to the Royal Navy. Without it the zippiest carriers, the fastest destroyers, even the Silent Service submarines, can’t operate. Because every item of supply the navy needs – from missiles to frozen chips, medical supplies to fuel, Mars bars to engine parts – ALL of it has to be delivered to wherever the RN needs it. If an army marches on its stomach, a navy sails on its suppliers, all the time, whenever ops are on. Which is why our socials are needed to encourage young people to think of a career with the RN’s life support system. And it’s not a bad deal – 4 months at sea then 3 months off, for a start.

And we owe a debt to Carnival – as the filming opportunity they gave us was on turnaround day, when hundreds of Iona’s passengers with hundreds and hundreds of pieces of luggage disembark… and hundreds more embark, ditto. With the ship towering over you, and travellers streaming past in both directions, it feels like something of a miracle each time: the companionways packed with indomitably cheerful crew members and luggage trolleys up and down throughout the day. In the middle of all that we traversed the ship, filmed interview after interview and watched cadets at work. Somehow it all got done in a morning – with a lot of walking; thankfully guided throughout. Without that we surely have got well and truly lost, and maybe found ourselves on an unbooked cruise, or at least held up departure until we were found…

First out pf the blocks to help us – Carnival UK, with Deck, Engineering and Electro-Technical cadets to film and interview. The company has already got the message involving more young people to get involved in a sea career – on board their cruise ship Iona, they offered a strong line-up of officer cadets – including Lizzie Quayle (picture), who’d joined Carnival UK’s cadet training scheme straight out of school. Much the youngest of the team, (“Everyone always says that” she smiled, with an admirable tolerance) it was plain she was having a whale of a time – particularly mentioning the support she gets from the ship’s officers. One of her fellow cadets had just finished a voyage to Norway…was off to the West Indies… then round the world in a Cunarder (Cunard being part of the Carnival group.) “Tough job”, etc etc…

One of the problems with maritime film-making, especially if you’re going to sea to do it – however short the sortie – is getting the right people with the right ship in the right time. To fix this up, I had a real “friend at court” – MNTB’s excellent Susan Bell (picture) – to pull those levers for me. But even when you have co-operation, there’s getting on, and even more so, getting off to factor in. Even if your ship can stop, deploying a boat ship to shore is a serious operation, and needs careful work to be safe. Indeed, most modern merchant ships don’t have boats they can use like that – mostly only the rear “ski jump” launch lifeboats, like the one that played such a key role in the excellent movie ‘Captain Philips’. So… one more key need to meet.