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That’s the aim of the trainees we’ve been filming aboard HMS Northumberland for Seafarers UK, in support of their annual big bash ‘Seafarers Awareness Week’ – which runs from the 20^th to the 28^th June. In that week, Seafarers UK highlight just how important the sea – and the seafarers who work it – are to Britain. (And the whole world in fact, but the remit’s for the UK!) This year we’re helping with a young people in training film series, and we’ve been helped by the Royal Navy. On board Northumberland,  day running out of Plymouth just now, is a group of engineering trainees – expertise always much needed by the RN, but all the more so now with the two new giant carriers coming on stream over the next few years. But that’s not all Northumberland has on her plate right now…

So here that idea is. Anshie Patel works at (deep breath) ‘The Institute of Marine Engineering, Science and Technology’. And… breathe out. Or just say IMarEST! The Institute is a force for good, keeping the seafaring world up to date on – well, marine engineering, science and technology across the globe.  Anshie is Marketing and Communications Executive at IMarEST, and with an eye out for a presenter for a film linking the five we’re going to make about seafarers in training, Seafarers UK thought she would fit the bill. And she does. The picture is from her screen test, which I can honestly say was just about flawless. She also passed the nit-pick test, as I made her retake… and retake… and retake again… but she kept her nerve and delivered. And all on her first time front of camera. Neat!

So… where does Maritime Films UK come in? Well, we’re hoping we can make 5 films for the week, focusing on young seafarers in training. That means filming with the Royal Navy; at the merchant navy college in Warsash; seeing a superyacht engineering trainee at Pendennis in Falmouth; going out on a workboat to capture the 24/7 support required for offshore energy installations like wind farms; and also, finding out how being a seafarer nowadays means more than getting into your blue jacket. For example: in the booming cruise ship world, hospitality is vital – and the people to run it. But they’re seafarers just as much as sailors and officers. Right now we’re still setting the films up in hopes of a go-ahead to start filming – but we need a presenter… and Seafarers UK had a very good idea…

It’s one of the big events in the UK’s maritime calendar and it’s coming round again. Organized by Seafarers UK, the top charity for seafarers, the Week reminds all of us in Britain just how important the sea and those who sail it are. By weight, 95% of everything we use comes to us by ship. Food, fuel, clothes, hi-fi, cars, toys, medicines, even Christmas decorations (one town in China supplies almost the entire world output of festive frills!) – all that and much much more comes to us over the sea. Which is why seafarers matter so much and why Seafarers UK are intent on making us recognize that, so they can raise funds to go on supporting all kinds of seafarers. So what Seafarers Awareness Week says is – thank you. We literally can’t do it – or anything – without you.

The terrible thing about being in a shipwreck – as Mission to Seafarers chaplains like Reverend Stephen Hazlett (picture) know – is that you lose everything, your possessions, your home and your job – and worst of all, your mates. One young sailor from the Baltic Ace held onto his friend in the sea as long as he could, till his shipmate said “You have to let me go… or we’ll both die… ” So, agonizingly, he did. Shameful to be treated as the survivors were by the hospital. But, the Mission to Seafarers were there, finding hotel accommodation, clothes and food – and above all giving comfort and support to the traumatized sailors. And next day too, as lawyers descended to grill the survivors about what happened. Stephen made sure he sat in on that session, supporting the seafarers. Flying Angel indeed.

The Baltic Ace was a car transporter – a specialized ship that carries cars for export and import. The Corvus J: a container ship, carrying the boxes that take most goods round the world now. (The picture shows how she looked after the collision – severe damage to her bow and foc’sle.) These two ships ran into each other on a dark night in the North Sea in December 2012. The Baltic Ace heeled over and sank, and her crew went into the bitter-cold sea. 13 were rescued – 11 were not, and of those 6 are missing to this day. When they got ashore the traumatized survivors were checked at the Erasmus Medical Centre in Rotterdam – then, no bodily hurt found, chucked out in the middle of the night. Shame on you, Dutch medics. To the rescue: The Mission to Seafarers.