Inside World's Most Advanced Destroyer: HMS Duncan | Warship: Life At Sea | Spark

paper was light gold in medieval times oh no tobacco sugar [Music] that everything we thought we knew about the world might turn out to be completely wrong [Music] this is the story of the most advanced warship of its kind in the world at the most dramatic time in its short history make sure that we are ready for anything hms duncan is a royal navy type 45 destroyer worth over a billion pounds bristling with technology this ship can track a cricket ball sized contact and three times the speed of sound at about 150 miles that's backed up by weaponry so my c viper missile system is the best air defense system in the world but this state-of-the-art ship is also home to 280 men and women do you understand the charges against you today yes sir earning cats mate that's what we're doing herding cats our cameras have been given unprecedented access to duncan's dramatic seven month mission as they come face to face with russian forces there is a challenge from russia at the moment that's aircraft passing the stern ports and the crew find themselves on the front line missiles rain down on syria it's pretty scary to think that we are literally at the center of everything that's happening we're just waiting now to see what happens and see if anybody fires at us [Music] it's 8 o'clock in the morning and the royal navy's hms duncan is preparing to set sail from portsmouth but with just a few hours until departure the ship's captain elena stack is fighting to get away on time feels particularly frenetic at the moment it's that that final last minute rush before deployment so getting stores on getting new people on board and integrated and all the final bits and pieces of material preparations that need to get done so it's a as you can see it's a busy old ship at the moment the stores include six tons of potatoes four thousand frozen chickens and forty five thousand toilet rolls good morning duncan good morning mom right wednesday east north easterly 20 knots and we're going to have some mixed hill fog low cloud and certainly in the fall noon thank you very much this is what we're going to be flying this morning which is the destroyer's effectiveness pennant this is due reflection of all the hard work that we duncanship company has put in to get the ship ready to be deploying for seven months today thank you carry on i was that school child in glasgow with no naval background we had the opportunity to go around hms argyle and i thought well that's quite interesting and my interest continued i think my parents thought i was going through a phase i think they still think i'm going through a phase and then lo and behold joining in 2000. navigator you're in charge getting the bridge ready for sea make sure all the screens [Music] 26 year old chef liam fletcher is one of the last to arrive this is his fifth tour but it will also be his longest not knock how are you mate you're right [Music] books trusty laptop for me deploying for a number of months it excites me you never know in today's world what's around the corner [Music] with just minutes before the ship sails liam hasn't got long to get ready [Music] i need your help these are a bit tighter than last time you're going to warm us on tv i should have laid off them [Music] pure team efforts okay liam's going to be away from home for almost 200 [Music] ready on the days i just want to get going now get a good job done after months of training and frantic last minute preparations duncan finally casts [Music] right now look at how this is shaping up now ship's head around to port [Applause] [Music] duncan's head into the mediterranean to rendezvous with a fleet of nato warships and lead them into the black sea its northeast corner borders russia and crimea and is one of the most sensitive areas in the world when we get our orders through for deployment there's always stuff that we need to be trained to equip for man for and then ready at any point to do you never quite know what's going to happen when we get into the black sea and what our presence there will provoke from other nations going to the black sea puts duncan on a potential collision course with the russians and no one knows how they'll react morning all right are you scrubbing can you get rid of this bucket behind that bucket somewhere the job of overseeing crew welfare rests with one key man hi how are you yeah martin watson is the ewo the executive warrant officer right everybody's here yeah right i am the eyes and ears on the ground it means i need to be absolutely everywhere from the front end of the ship to the back end of the ship it's good and if something's not exactly running right it's up to me as that impartial person on board to feed that back to the captain you've been doing the duty smoker so if you went to d if you had to clean that up today what do you do how do you do it well that's the problem that's exactly what i was going to say so down the side of the ship you get these guess what loads of ash and black mark so pass the buds around is that not to throw it all over the side that's the ewok knock knock hello there well gentlemen the miranda's all okay on board that's what i generally do is have a one drain and try and keep a bit and look that's mine that's my anchor chief resigning there now that's quite funny that i've come in and urine in my handkerchief my sister says to me she said you're the only 40 year old man in all who goes around with anky chief well you work very hard so thank you very much anyway thank you very much talk about morale this creates morale so obviously we've got all these chocolates and sweets here so some people call this the colonel colonel kadafit nafi come on let's have a little look so pot noodle chris chocolate bar that was a bit embarrassing for lesser i've been in the in the navy 26 years this year i left my uh my family 16 year old and joined the navy being at ces is where it's at it's uh it's a bit more money which is always good um but it's also seeing the world a little bit more as well so that's that's why i'm here is to see that world and at the same time we might do a little bit of work on the way hey yeah good hms duncan is seriously overcrowded with nearly 280 men and women on board there aren't enough proper beds to go around so how busy and packed we are at the moment if you can squeeze in so this is uh made up for uh two of our young officers who are on board ship so this is typical at the moment as where we are on board our ship it's uh we're absolutely maxed out and unfortunately we've had to make up some some other compartments at where people can live when space is at a premium the newest sailors usually get a raw deal this is the camperdown mess also known as austerity this is where basically the sprague's frogs join up what's going on here eighteen-year-old owen clements is the youngest on the ship and it's his first time away from home this is the best area of the mess right back here my man baby here cover stoker's stoked up there my pit up here pretty messy that must have been difficult at first it's difficult when you're pissed when you put your bit isolated from everyone else which is quite nice the only bad thing is you've got to climb up and it's annoying to make your bed in the mornings so you've got a bad nightmare and you're gonna wake up and smack your head oh it's not made in the night it's the only bit that no one can mess with it's my only my only personal area we wanted them as well to clip the curtains together no one's getting in this is my first time i see never been abroad in my life i've been to wales but i don't really count so a bit of a shock at first but it's quite exciting at the same time knowing that i was doing what i joined up to do right so my mum little owen probably about two three years old at the time pictures of my missus that she printed out for me casualty [Music] martin watson is coordinating the emergency response one of our ship's company complaining of chess issues and he took himself down to sickbay where he actually severely deteriorated from there a 36 year old helicopter engineer may have suffered a heart attack his life now depends on his own colleagues in the flight the crew priorities are number one to deal with the casualty number two to prepare for casino act t1 is our most severe casualty uh classification uh so that basically means that there's a requirement for what we call a casual cluster evacuation which has been activated and our own helicopter is being made ready for that now [Music] two of the ship's medics will accompany the casualty on the flight a hospital on the mainland is his best chance of survival [Music] duncan is racing towards the black sea pull it towards you normally when a ship needs to refuel she goes into port but they don't have time we're going to drive my ship alongside a floating and moving petrol station and fueling the ship so that is challenging um but also for a lot of my team this is their first time aboard hms this nozzle will pump half a million liters into duncan's fuel tanks raz party razz is navy speak for replenishment at sea i love doing rises yeah rising at seas is possibly one of the most challenging but rewarding things that you didn't come out i am driving my ship to position myself between 36 and 42 meters lateral separation from the tanker that does not get more challenging than that in terms of ship handling forty-year-old captain stack has been in command of duncan for 18 months they're 2-7-0 it's a huge responsibility and i think about that responsibility every day if i wasn't thinking about that responsibility i'd be in the wrong job and it is a hard job and no commanding officer in any military unit would say otherwise but that's why we do it refuelling will take two hours duncan's engines are huge they generate enough electricity to power over 18 000 homes [Music] 18 year old owen has drawn another short straw these strainers they tend to get blocked up or seaweed or fish guts or all that sort of stuff all we do is take it out and clean it it doesn't really take a genius to do loads of now look down right down there it's the reason why i joined that so how are you finding your first deployment up and down there's obviously times where you want it all to end straight away mum is probably one of the people i miss the most my dad's as well i'm trying to find my missus when i can as well it's a bit of a shock to her because i'm away for seven months with contact weekends and then when we get to the backseat it'll be very rare because when he gets to the nighttime bedtime it can get quite miserable but because i've got a bed nothing else on my mind so pictures are off my wall it's kind of sad not to think about it is now available it's the collection the fuel tanker has also delivered the mail a big moment for everyone owen's hoping there'll be something for him [Music] during these photos my granddad's my mom my uncle michael is it nice receiving stuff like this yeah especially when i've had an email since since leaving oh no i'm not going to show you this pretty personally sent me is it nice to receive some letters though yes i'll show you one thing about what many prices with refuelling finished there's just time to uphold a navy tradition of thanking the tanker's captain the present is a picture of the flying ship duncan and a toy adorned with hms duncan's specially commissioned tartan to present misabity soon to be seen on the catwalk in milan duncan's helicopter is coming back [Applause] [Music] the flight engineer suspected of having a heart attack is recovering in hospital one of the medics who flew with him is 28 year old rhianne dillmore so never a dull diamond duncan is it never at the day oh you're back yeah literally just got back we've got him off and he's he's getting swords getting the care he needs and he's in good spirits he's in a little bit of pain but he's in good spirits so it's good news for rhiann she deals with everything from blisters to gunshot wounds i don't think there's many people that can say that they've got such a varied lifestyle in that in their job i mean there's always negatives to to anything not everything's always sunshine and raindrops and lollipops but yeah i couldn't think of a better career to be honest [Music] her next job is a little different it's always funky to cover your monkey the navy has a strict no touching policy on board no glove no love but precautions for sure leave are taken seriously have a happy condom day the condom fairy do they know you're the condom fairy well no it's a secret absolute secret stis and stuff it just can affect a force just as much as as the next disease there's always a couple of cases um on a deployment excuse me wants everyone to be safe when the ship goes into port condoms stay safe that's it that's condom fairy gt done [Music] duncan is no longer alone she's been joined by allied warships we are looking forward to this deployment an honor for us to work with the duncan's crew [Music] she's taking on the role of the nato flagship putting her in charge of a fleet of four ships it's a very big deal for us to be the flagship so and that this is the first time a type 45 destroyer has acted as the flagship but being the flagship means the captain's job is about to change she's getting a new boss [Music] nato commodore mike utley is taking over as top dog the captain is responsible for everything that goes on in this ship i am if you like the next level up where i'm given um a number of ships within my mission i'm in command of a nato task group across a number of areas the commodore's first job is to explain why they're going into the black sea its northeastern area is fraught with tension after russian forces moved into crimea in 2014 for many of the crew this will be their first taste of a potentially hostile environment the people that deploy on operations need to understand what it is they're here to do um as the commander of the task group i i've got a responsibility to make sure they understand why why we're going to do what we're going to do what their role is in it and that they're prepared for it [Music] do you hear their commodore speaking good evening duncan let's not be under any doubt that we do not have normal relations with russia every country has a right to exercise and go about its own vessels but what we don't expect is for other countries to occupy other countries in the way that russia has annexed crimea where we are going to go over the coming weeks and in particular the black sea russia has shown itself to really flex its muscles and for our allies that reside in those areas these are genuinely difficult and challenging times that is all inspiring in it not bad for a commodore to brief your ship's company even though there is like russian ships and all sorts going around the black sea itself i'm not really that worried about it because i'm confident in the in the crew's abilities the black sea's obviously got its own uh area of of surveillance by our our russian colleagues we've got massive jobs to do here a countries still look to us to lead to be at the forefront with helping them with their struggles what i want duncan to know is that they are at the absolute forefront of that and over the coming weeks that's exactly where they'll be the commodore is taking the fleet deep into the most tense regions of the black sea duncan is heading straight into the lion's den [Music] it's early morning 26 year old liam fletcher is one of duncan's ten chefs getting up at two in the morning can measure your body clock up the first shift you know you start getting really tired but then after that your body sort of gets used to it as a chef you work all different ridiculous errors um night shifts tend to be quite good though because they're pretty quiet liam cases for all occasions from banquets to burgers and everything is homemade uh for breakfast we have got sausages bacon baked beans tomatoes porridge eggs to order and american pancakes that's quite interesting we have two breakfasts one at three o'clock and one at seven o'clock the first one's always busiest because that's where the watch changeover happens but 266 people pretty much all within an hour we ordered more eggs palsy i joined the navy because i was a bit bored of civilian chef in bacon you know i've done it for about eight years i wanted to travel but i didn't have enough money to travel so i thought well why not join the navy get fit in the process meet the people from all over the world and still be able to share most most days it's really good i know i do actually enjoy it the chefs prepare nearly 300 breakfasts lunches and dinners every day making it one of the busiest jobs on board good morning good morning i don't even know what day it is [Music] i lost my dad in 2009 and that's always constantly on the back of my mind and i wish i wish my dad was here to see me i genuinely do and especially at my passo when i was standing on the playground waiting to march out when i was standing on the playground just looking up and seeing my mom and my granddad and the rest of my family in the in the crowd i was just i literally looked up and i thought i just wish my dad was here right now and yeah i did get a bit choked up standing on the playground but i know he'd be proud [Music] hms duncan is about to enter the black sea but must first pass through the bosphorus a narrow channel which divides the turkish city of istanbul [Music] going through any streets transit like this and we're looking for anything that's good a threat to me and this is the challenge here a threat could come from either side this close to land duncan is within range of the most terrorists areas of the north australia therefore the smoking area is now out of bounds anyone on the upper deck to ensure headgear is to be worn such a narrow channel is tricky for a ship the size of duncan so a turkish pilot is coming on board to [Music] help reports like this is mandatory especially for a vessel this size their knowledge and their experience is extremely useful and clearly the language but the difference with military vessels is when the pilots come on board they do not take the con they do not drive the ship in themselves with a lot of merchant vessels that's what they all expect to do sector hms [Music] the marine mammal log actually log marine mammals marine mammals can be affected by our activities especially when they're transmitting the sonar so it's important that we monitor their activities and send our reports in it could be russian orphans [Applause] at the narrowest part of the bosphorus one of duncan's two propellers suddenly stops captain port drive channel 3 controller is completely dead steering on one propeller is complicated only having the ship drive on the stop shaft affects the steering of the ship so the amount of steers that they have to put on and the rudder has to change with that loss of the porsche continuing the broken propeller causes the turkish pilot and duncan's navigator to disagree he knows that we've been up and down the streets before he knows that the navigator is well trained to do this kind of uh navigation but there's always that delicate balance in the relationship some pilots like to make it more strongly than others oh good one the final bridge spanning the bosphorus marks the start of duncan's black sea mission we have crossed the line welcome to the black sea i've never operated in the black sea some of my most experienced senior ratings who've been in the navy a very long time have never operated in the black sea it's a fascinating place from now on duncan needs to be on the lookout for threats around the clock [Music] all their intelligence is gathered in the nerve center of the ship [Music] welcome to hms duncan's uh operations room it's also james smith's second home this is the the heart of the ship it's the reason we have a warship rather than just a ship and what we have in here is all our weapons and sensors all our people who are manning those making sure that we can fight the ship and defend ourselves literally our job is to take the information that we have to make analysis to make an informed decision relay that information with the captain sell our decision making to the captain so she can make an informed decision about what our posture should be suddenly there's an alarm [Music] they've spotted a warship on the horizon and they think it's russian hands to action stations and to do action stations battle bags with antique money live jackets and overalls are to be carried by all personnel there yeah that's that nine this unit here is a vacuum warship so it's heavily armed this is why we've come to actually now to be prepared to deter them to be prepared to sort of have any other interactions with them we don't want to escalate situation but we are sort of at a raised a raised level now um because you never know where's the russian mansion the russian warship begins shadowing duncan [Music] it'll be here to get as much information on how we operate as it can as a way of building their picture of how nato operates in the black sea what wouldn't surprise me is if this this unit followed us that for our period in the black sea i expect we'll probably get to know this crevack particularly well over the next three weeks as soon as we come into this area they challenge our right to navigate freely on the high seas by immediately meeting us with the warship that is a challenge [Music] all eyes are on the russian warship sbs running talking but that's about to change [Music] [Music] the man overboard alarm has sounded duncan is circling the search zone aware that a russian warship is watching report 35 get the wheel on 4 35 switch on [Music] [Music] [Music] martin watson begins an urgent head count to find out who's missing one of our ship's companies activated the the man overboard alarm which has uh set all of us as the ship's company to find out exactly what's going on [Music] captain elena stack has turned her attention away from the russian warship to oversee the rescue [Music] the medic rhiann is going out to offer first aid to the man overboard but with light fading fast the search is getting desperate [Music] the ship's head count is almost complete that is a 100 manpower check of the ship's company therefore i can confirm the maneuver board was not one of our ships company the tree they found there's nothing in the water there we passed a log about two minutes before it's on the right action right up until about five meters away we still thought it was someone it looked like someone doing this in the water and we get to the tree and we're like oh it's a tree that's fine you can stay you can stay in the waters no dramas there in this case it wasn't a a body but this happens unfortunately i see uh quite a lot you will come across sometimes bodies at sea um and and you don't know necessarily know where they come from and you have to deal with that and you have to deal with managing that with with the ship's company as well it's the second time this has happened to me i need a drink tonight throughout the emergency the russian ship was watching their every move but duncan and the nato fleet are about to go into the safety of port where the russians won't follow duncan's preparing to entertain her nato allies are you guys coming to the cocktail park no i'm not talking here i just have to work and get it all ready [Music] it's quite a finicky job and there's a lot to do we've got 190 people coming right ladies and gentlemen official hospitality is what the royal navy does best we've been doing this for hundreds of years and tonight will be no exception i don't expect junior officers to find the most attractive male or female in the room and just speak to them i want you to speak to the whole plethora of people we have tonight it gives you a really great opportunity to have that sense of what a country is about for the military side of things it offers us that chance as well to to thank other militaries for working with them and i find them fascinating usually with shopping nine times out of ten you stop behind the scenes and you know you put so much effort into the food that people eat and a lot of the time you don't really get to see how appreciated it is and it's really rewarding by my chefs i'm too scared to have them because they're too beautiful and i think you need as my mother would say family hold back what are you doing tonight what's your job i'm basically in charge of getting everyone adequately inebriated in a sensible manner making sure people don't go too far and serving the queen's finest alcohol tell me what we got to be honest that's i'm not really too sure well you need to find out don't you get your hands on it yeah asparagus wrapped in ham bit of parmesan what's this one you've um to know what they are don't you [Music] the party is a success but inevitably the conversation turns to russia putin he is not our friend the russian threat is out there and it is real so we have to be understanding of that they consider a black seal like a russian lake they don't consider black sea like a free free sea you know that's how serious this is russian it's very serious anybody doesn't think the russians are a threat they're living in a dream world the following morning duncan is barely out of port m p wasted that bisectors when the russian ship re-emerges it's been waiting for them [Music] five miles now suspect not conforming to lh a russian fighter plane [Music] is heading towards duncan where is it relationships left to right [Music] we have a suspect aircraft closely force visually identified as a russian federation fencer aircraft turning right to left this is the first time in our two departments of waxy that we've actually seen in russian aircraft and scraps is that over the crew back now then the turn trucking the arrival of the russian jet is an escalation the question now is what will happen next we always talk about threat being capability and intent so we have a very good idea of their capability the intent is the hardest thing to prove three three two five [Music] the military commander is always interesting to see what the other guy is prepared to do his balance of how much of your hand you show [Music] quite a lot was showing that [Music] next time chef fletcher and his team are under pressure so we need to feed everyone as fast as we can no time wasting we need to get people through coming in there's a surprise for the crew we've got the drug testing team on board there's only myself the captain and our commodore who know about it and tensions with the russians reach a whole new level 16 or 17 russian aircraft and the closest one we had was about 200 yards off the beam which is nothing we've ever seen before be ready for them to come back

Channel: Spark

Views: 295,125

Keywords: Spark, Science, Technology, Engineering, Learning, How To, education, documentary, factual, mind blown, bbc documentary, Science documentary, hms duncan modern warship, hms duncan documentary, hms duncan russian jets, hms duncan warship life at sea, hms duncan season 1, hms duncan channel 5, warship life at sea, warship life at sea season 1, warship life at sea channel 5, type 45 destroyer, type 45 destroyer firing, type 45 russia, type 45 daring class destroyer, royal navy warship

Id: 90V9h7Srvdw

Length: 44min 50sec (2690 seconds)

Published: Mon Aug 09 2021