DASHERDITS

The Periodical from Bristol University Royal Naval Unit and HMS DasherIssue 6 – May/June 2014 Editor: Lucy.Hall@bristol.ac.uk

To broaden Naval understanding and develop undergraduates who show potential to become the leaders of tomorrow, through maritime experience and exposure to the values and ethos of the Royal navy.

CO’s RoundupAs always, it’s been a busy month since we were last in touch, in fact possibly the busiest so far. We have recently returned from our Easter Deployment which saw us transit around the South Coast of the UK and North Coast of France. We had glorious weather for much of the trip, and enjoyed some fantastic hospitality in many of the ports. We were lucky enough to be able to berth in our affiliated town of Padstow, where we ran the annual Padstow Dash charity event, more details below. We were also involved in a submarine training exercise with HMS TORBAY and nearly assisted with a MAYDAY call. We’re now frantically preparing for our next deployment which will see us transit as far as Northern Spain. We are hoping for even better weather, calmer seas and new horizons.

Easter Deployment – Phase 1 By Mid J Aspin

Devonport, dawn, dreary eyed and dead to the world; a dozen Dasherites dawdled down to Dasher; docked in her designated domicile. Dauntlessly we drove our dear Dasher down to our destination. Dancing on the waves like a duck, we made way. At Cowes we detected our dastardly disputants, the ‘storm-bound’ HMS Puncher; four days, not daring to depart the dockyard dreading the disturbance and downpour of the Solent.

Dieppe, days later, disaster! Dasher’s crash test dummy disembarked the ship direct into the drink. Man Overboard Stations called and distress button hit, the Dasherites darted to their stations and rescue our endangered dummy, delaying his death for another day.

Fecamp, what a night. Dancing at the local discotheque, what a dive! DJ Cooper usurped the in- house DJ and demonstrated our somewhat odd taste in music. Some displeased locals, decided to take advantage and demand to get on Dasher. Declining their demand, the Dasherites dealt with all manner of disorder from the ‘diablos’. We defended our dearest Dasher, the Dasherites dispersed the drunkards and disengaged to the Mess square for another drink and a well deserved sleep.

Deaville, so dissimilar to the previous night, a delightful drove of Deauvillians welcomed us into their town with open arms. They opened their drinks emporium and we donned our civvies and took part in the festivities. We dispatched ourselves back to Dasher then on to the casino whilst Cameron and XO were distracted by the local delicacy ‘Mirabelle’and drank and drank and drank and drank and drank.

The next morning, a delicate Cameron awoke, his condition declining, his liver decaying, his will to live diminishing. However whilst Cameron convalesced the CO and XO decided to undermine the trust the students had so faithfully placed in their commanding officer; Strickland, Vint and Perks were dressed and prepared to be winched onto a helicopter whilst being shot at with a 50 cal for training purposes. The students waited eagerly for their helicopter,

anxious yet excited. The XO knew the joke could not be carried on any further, with his students looking daft in their new attire phots were taken, and the joke revealed.

The last day on the ship. Departing Cherbourg; destination Weymouth, disaster struck once more. The RADAR was down. Fortunately Alice Boyd was on hand to calibrate the RADAR, under the careful guidance of the CO and XO. The dastardly duo devised their devilish navy bite for the second time this deployment. Poor Boyd under the direction of the XO, desperately, for the good of Dasher attempted to calibrate the RADAR. She spun left and spun right, then ran around in circles wielding her baking tray – as this is the well known procedure for calibrating such devices!

Dasher docked in Weymouth the next day, the Dasherites diligently took to preparing for Captain’s rounds. Decks were dusted and disinfected, and soon Dasher dazzled, dirtless, in the daylight. A diamond deployment, done and dusted.

Easter Deployment – Phase 2 By Mid B Dew

Clearly being the best of the two phases which occurred over Easter, Phase 2 got off to a great start in Weymouth, with preparations for our watch challenges which included: collecting items from every port, baking competitions and the creation of a model Dasher.

We had many eventful passages including responding to a mayday call outside of Dartmouth as well as certain members of the unit falling ill to extreme sea sickness, much to the joy of the XO.

On arrival to our affiliated port of Padstow, we were greeted with pasties from Choughs Bakery and the press to document the momentous occasion that is the annual Padstow Dash. Meanwhile, alongside in Padstow, Dasher was

privileged to host local dignitaries including Commodore Miller for a Reception on Board.

The deployment featured many great runs ashore, including the celebration of Phil Bassindale’s 25th birthday in Swansea, where he was subjected to 25 challenges allocated by his peers!

However, arguably the best day of deployment came on a ‘harbour’ day in Cardiff. We were greeted with a 0900 exercise: A hawk jet had ditched in Cardiff Bay. The ships company were unavailable, leaving the students to navigate to the GPS location of the jet and rescue the downed airman taking the ‘ghosts’ of the ships company with us. This naturally led to a FIREEX and MOBEX before returning Dasher to our berth. Decoding the signal found on the airman lead us to end of deployment drinks.

Overall it was a fantastic deployment and arguably my favourite to date.

Padstow Dash 2014 By MID J Aspin

Continuing the highly successful ‘Padstow Dash’ organised by Sean Vanstone last year, Bristol URNU returned to our affiliated Cornish town to retry the reverse jailbreak with some old and new faces. This year the ‘Dash’ would take a slightly different approach, rather than matching the divisions against each other, the current Bristol URNU would take on a DOFA team from the alumni of past students. Both teams would be given ten hours to travel from the ship moored in Padstow, back to HMS Flying Fox in Bristol with no organised transport and no money. The URNU had their uniforms, wits (loosely speaking) and their MOD badges, whilst our DOFA contingent donned pirate rig all in aid of the Royal Navy Royal Marines Charity.

We began at 0900 sharp, with both teams eager to go. After a brief safety talk from the Boss he gave the teams the all clear and students past and present sprung into action. Initially the DOFA team headed straight out of Padstow,rather alarmingly the Bristol URNU team, after 20 minutes, had made it roughly fifty feet away from ship, jumping up and down in the attempt to create ‘the invisible bus.’

The support drivers decided to take advantage of this rare time to relax and in true URNU fashion set up HQ in a local pub tucking into a welcome bacon butty. This year we would be throwing our participants a few curve balls to keep them on their feet. On the hour, every hour a challenge would be texted through to our teams which they would complete in exchange for points on top of the list of challenges they had been given prior to the event. Bexy and her subteam; eyes on the prize headed straight for the Eden project whereas the DOFA team headed for Doc Martin’s

house.

Happily the rain soon made way for the sun and the teams were steaming towards their destination. Amrita and co hitched a ride in a steam train only to be out done by Sean Vanstone and Alex Few whom very skilfully managed to hitch a ride in a small plane! With both teams hard at work, Harry and Cooper decided that they had the time to nip into RNAS Yeovilton for a cuppa, and to reflect on the previous couple of hours hard work. But their rest was to be short lived, as the next challenge came through; get as far underground as possible. A flash of inspiration occurred and they immediately dashed across to Wookie Hole, using all the charm and charisma they had they stole victory and points for this challenge.

Padstow Dash 2014 (Cont’d)

Thankfully both teams made it back to Bristol safely, the Bristol URNU team arriving with ten minutes to spare, the DOFA team with a mere thirty seconds left on the clock. But even more thankfully Bristol URNU did actually manage to win the most points and subsequently won the Dash –DOFA would never have let us hear the end of it had they manage to steal victory. But winning and losing aside, we managed to raise a lot of money for a great cause and had a great time doing it. A big thank you to our support drivers; Charlotte Caine, George Stanford, and Alex Alderton without whom the day could not have happened, and a big BZ to all involved!

Easter Flying Camp By Mid G Stanford

This year it was my turn to be the lucky one chosen to attend the URNU Easter flying camp at RNAS Yeovilton. Two weeks of flying training whist accommodated in the wardroom, bring it on! Thirteen of us, from twelve URNU’s, duly arrived at HMS Heron and set about getting to know our new course mates. With everyone ranging from a Glaswegian engineer to a Dentist from Brighton it promised to be a lively couple of weeks.

Our first day started off bright and sunny as we set off to be issued our flying kit, three hours later we all looked the part and were shipped over to 727 squadron; home of the Grob tutors we were all so desperate to have a go in. The afternoon was spent being introduced to the Grob on the ground and in the air, big smiles all

round. Unfortunately the next day the weather returned to form over Somerset and flying could only commence mid-afternoon. This set the pattern for the rest of the week. Fortunately there is a lot to see and do whilst at Yeovilton. Visits included the school of fighter control, the control tower, the ‘junglie’ squadrons and the historic flight. A few lucky students managed to get a go in the Lynx simulator.

After a long weekend, Army Navy weekend for those who went, we reassembled at Yeovilton praying for some better weather. By now we had all had at least two flights under our belts and were craving some more. Sadly the weather remained uncooperative; in order to speed things along our instructors decided to skip straight to the ‘cool stuff’. The formation flying was a particular highlight for me, and a truly unique experience, turns out it‘s not as easy as it looks! As a consolation prize we were informed of a special treat awaiting us on the final day, the ‘air 319’ course. This turned out to be the fearsome ‘dunker’, which is a decidedly character building experience. The certificate of completion definitely now ranks as one of my proudest possessions!

Despite of the weather’s best efforts, a truly fantastic fortnight was had by all. Special thanks must be said to Lt Forrest for organising all our visits and making Easter flying camp 2014 happen.

Upcoming Events

07 June HMS Dasher to attend D Day Celebrations in Torquay

17 June Bristol URNU Annual Reception

21 June HMS Dasher to attend Armed Forces Day in Exeter

21 June – 03 Aug HMS Dasher Summer Deployment

We’re always looking to volunteer, assist and maximise the experience for Students. Planning an event? Need some help? Please get in touch

0117 966 8667 ext 2176 or Lucy.Hall@bristol.ac.uk