These training films were very important for many serving members of the uk forces. It enabled you to catch up on lost sleep in a darkened classroom or theatre.
@@dadillen5902 That was our life, though. The navy, especially on a mine layer which carries a bloated contingent of crew because of the mines, consists of a lot of sleeping. And some work in-between, I suppose. We were the heroes you never heard about.
Thank fuck for that! Just as I was on the verge of a panic attack following the blood chilling realisation that I didn't have the first, solitary _clue_ vis a vis the correct procedure for laying naval mines from a Royal Navy mine-layer circa 1976, up popped this highly informative video. Phew, close one! Thanks again RU-vid recommendations!
if I recall most modern (in the sense of post second world war) seamines (and even some landmines like the SLAM) have timers in them where they can be set to detonate after a set time, it's very important to properly log the locations where mines of any kind are deployed but accidents can happen so great care must be taken, everything from highly trained frogmen, drones, dolphins and specialy built minimum metal minesweepers are used to locate, recover or if damaged or degraded perform a controlled detonation on minefields after hostilities cease
Its less efficient and cost way to much money to go back through and find mines layed. Also a country wouldnt wanna risk their men dieing from their own mines. Its easier and cost less money to leave them were they lay. Now a days tho mines layed are 9/10 are made to make themselves inert after a certain amount of time. The 1/10 are dumb mines that guerilla fighters lay and improvise. Those are the mines that'll kill you not the ones layed by a major militarys. Now there are mines out there from previous conflicts from times when we didnt have mines that made themselves inert. In that case it's still better to let them lay where they are and mark the area off. Its easier to let people know they're there and cost less money then going through and finding each one. Its extremely stupid to go out to find them too because most militarys made mines hard as hell to find and detect.
@@nickdavis2128 If it costs too much money, it shouldn't be done. It's a lot more 'efficient' for me to drop litter in the street than find a bin, but I don't, becuase it's disguisting. The disregard our ISLAND has shown the seas over the last 100 years is an absolute disgrace. We should be ashamed
I too had a loan draft in 1982. Just as the falklands was blowing up the Scabby Ab went to the Med with the reserves. “They must be trained” was the cry! At the end we waited to turn right back to Rosyth as everyone else was heading south. I was always told the vessel was a converted Norwegian car ferry and AFO’s stated it was not to entire any war zone. Enjoyed time on board.
Always remember being on HMS Abdiel on a Sea Cadet jolly in the late sixties from Rosyth to her adopted town of Hartlepool. I always will remember making way along.g the Firth of the Forth on a glorious day.
I have made diligent notes on this complex procedure and have comitted this to memory. Now how do I apply this valuable information to my job as a waiter?
By carefully taking the nautical measurements of dining area and placing strategically located slippery spots via "accidental" spillages of water to make the bussers slip.
I feel sometimes we forget how huge these things are in real life, honestly the scary thing is that these mines are big enough explosive payload wise where even an indirect detonation could crack the hull via sheer concussive force caused by the HE detonation, I was watching a video by jive Turkey on sea mines and he was talking about the latest models, one of which contains an autonomous torpedo designed to launch from under or near a target ship and these other advanced "smart mines" that are designed to explode underneath a ship in such a way that not only will the concussion damage the hull but that a void will form under the ship so it falls into a gap made out of superheated steam in aich a way it cracks the hull like a stale baguette on a concrete floor, you hear a lot about conventional AT and AP mines in addition to IEDs but I feel folks forget the power, danger and sheer lethality sea mines possess, be they old school floating mines or the autonomous "smart mines" of the modern navy
I mean, the track is closed except at the point where they load it, they'd have to remove the mines behind it to let it off the track, but they have to lay those...so off it goes just like the mines
I assume the spacer is designed to be disposable in a real minefield (mainly as the mines are more expensive (and expendable as well) and raw danger of turning around in the minelayer to recover them) but I am surprised they don't rig the training models with floats or radio beacons so they can recover them for reuse (I assume the training mines are expensive and thus reusable, obviously a live one isn't though lol :D)
Phillip Richmond Do you have knowledge of this ship and the mine laying precedure? I have a mine from this ship. Have a look at my utube channel as ive put a few films on about my mine. Im told my mine comes from this ship.
I'm embarrassed to realise that I've been doing it wrong for years. All this time I've just been rolling them off the back of ferries when nobody was looking. I need to study this and tighten up my technique. Thanks RU-vid!
I was an FTG aboard USS Joseph Strauss DDG-16 during deployments in 1970 and 1972. On June 4, 1972 just after midnight while making a firing run on a North Vietnam target, a huge underwater explosion under the bow, picked up the front half of the ship out of the water. The ship fluttered for several seconds, then slammed back into the water. Boilers went out. Engines went out. Strauss was dead in the water off the coast of North Vietnam. Several minutes later, another huge underwater explosion off the portside rolled the ship to starboard. 10 degrees, 20 degrees, 30 degrees, etc. Somewhere close to 35 degrees the rolling started slowing. The ship rolled to about 40 or 45 degrees, then started up-righting itself. Strauss was towed farther out. Boilers were relit. Engines refired. Strauss remained on station. USS Warrington DD-843 also experienced two huge underwater explosions. Warrington was towed to Subic Bay and was decommissioned due to the damage. USS Hollister DD-788 also experienced two huge underwater explosions. Hollister was able to remain on station. The damage to these ships were from mislaid U.S. Mark 36 Destructor Mines that were laid during Operation Pocket Money in May 1972 off North Vietnam harbors.
I have an actual practice mine from this training ship . Its a MK 17 on its sinker. I have studied this film to try and see my actual mine by looking for the URN number painted onto the sinker. I have added a few videos to utube if anyone is interested.
is it in a shead, hot fuzz style? :D (but in all seriousness how do you store something that large and valuable as a collectable (and even though a training mine possibly respected depending on where you live) artifact?)
Modern day safety equipment: You need double interlocks on everything, survival suits, automatic life vests, GPS beacons etc. 1970s safety equipment: Here is a bit of rope. Now get on with it.
The 70's was such an interesting inflection point of history. It was the decade that invented the microprocessor and the Space Shuttle. But a ton of stuff was still completely unchanged from World War II. Huck some mines out the back with a rope, and time them with a wind-up stopwatch and write notes on paper. But also the mines can be nukes.
Mine laying ship looks ready for the scrapyard. This was 40 odd years ago about when berets were introduced to general service. I suspect newer type mines would be used nowadays and placed in position from submarines.
They also aren't always laid with the intention of sinking anything. But instead as area denial. If say, you know the English channel is full of mines. You are not going to sail through it. Therefore it doesn't need to be guarded (or not much anyway). Even if in truth there aren't many mines there. So long as the enemy knows there are mines in the area. They do their job.
Its a good long lasting design but the appearance itself is deceptive. There were several mechanical improvements and differences in not just the construction of the naval mine but also the mine laying strategy as a whole.
It would only be one of many tests they would go through, during and after production, on a set schedule while in storage, when moved from storage to the docks, and then once embarked on the ship. The reason for doing it on the ship is twofold. 1 is because they can repair many of the problems that they test for, such as bad connections in the control circuits, failing batteries, damaged switches etc, thus ensuring a properly functioning mine. And reason 2 follows on that. They don't want to lay a faulty mine, because it is a danger to their own ships. Whether it has a faulty arming circuit and detonates right behind the laying ship, or doesn't properly anchor itself because of a bad release mechanism, etc. Mines are very dangerous weapons to everyone, and the only way they work for the navy that lays them is if they are exactly where they are supposed to be, and that requires proper functionality of the systems, and so if they find a problem in the testing that they can not repair, then they would have some procedures in place to either jettison it unarmed and vented so that it just sinks to the bottom inert and harmless, or jettison it with some sort of demolition charge or a self destruct timer, or retain it on the ship to take back to port. (if the weather was decent, they could use the ships crane to shuffle the mines and move the faulty one to the rear of the line)
@ADEBISI ADEBISI actually, you are the one looking stupid for attacking someone for asking a question. Without knowing that this is only one of a series of tests, or that some problems could be repaired, it's a pretty good question.
ADEBISI ADEBISI He literally just asked a question, you're a disgrace to all of mankind so would you kindly delete your google account and cancel your internet? That would be a good thing for all of us, you included.
@@bobthedog123456 yes, even after factory quality control checks its wise to make sure they work before deployment, my favorite example of how poorly stored munitions can bite you in the arse is during the first phase of the Korean war most bazooka rockets issued were not properly stored and had had their fuses or motors degrade so when the North Korean T-34s started rolling south best case you might get a detonation, worse case you have a rocket fire but not detonate the HEAT charge or not even leave the tube) if your going to be deploying weaponry intended to protect you and the lives of your fellow service personnel you better damn well check it, this might be second nature for things like firearms but do you really want be known as the person who's incompetence allowed a dud field of mines be deployed, allowing a hostile fleet or submarine Wolfpack to cruise into a vital see lane like they are going for a weekend fishing trip? as redundant as it sounds checking your equipment, be it a rifle or AT to something as large as a seamine or other high yield device can and will save your and possibly others lives if god forbid you need to fire shots (or lay the eggs from hell) in anger
Vessels turn starboard to give way, and so do so more often. Possibly in more of a hurry, so the horn signal to turn stbd is one blast, port two and astern three. This just echoes that.
Huh, interesting so when one buys a 1970 British mine layer, one must know how to operate it. Now all I need is to raise 5.7 million for an old mine layer
There’s a YT of combat footage in Afghanistan. Every time a GPMG or the American equivalent fires a burst. The captions write “Applause... Applause... Applause” I’ve no idea if the captions are deliberate or a mistake, but they’re very fitting.
Because they; don't blow off, take up minimal stowage, look smart. I wore one in the 1970-80's as a Junior Recruit and Naval Apprentice but they were not allowed in the fleet until late 80's in the RAN.
35 years earlier 4,000 ton 40knot Abdiel class minelayer. N21 featured in the film above was N21 HMS Abdiel: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-5NWAfmrH5SI.html
We all know this was a training film and exercise, the white thing on top is the bobber so the mine sweeping team can practice recovery of mine laid in the mine laying film lol.
I had the Abdiel in 1980 as a three month loan draft while the Arethusa went into refit. I was a Seaman ( radar) at the time but branch changed to Mine Warfare during the first Gulf war. I spent nine months in 1991 clearing mines off Kuwait. I'm now in the Royal Fleet Auxiliary. I've still got a photo of my mate Michael McKeever, in tropical uniform, passed out on a bottom bunk on the Abdiel while alongside in Palma, Majorca. We'd been out drinking all day. He'd just pissed himself and it wasn't even his bunk. I still brings tears of laughter 40 years on. Oh to be 18 again.
As Chris said below, Minesweepers do it, they have very special equipment to accomplish it. I did some time on Minesweepers, and it is an interesting art. The quips on the MSO's was "Wooden ships and iron men", (Yes, they were wooden ships!) and "Any ship can be a minesweeper,...once!"
They are set to a depth. They float while the sinker sinks, ans pays out cable, then the cable is locked at a set depth and then the sinker drags the mine down with it.
@@smpgeek I think so. Thought they can lay mines in places like Sydney harbor where they can be retrieved early but if they're anticipating enemy ships there you know we're in a bad situation.
It's in the track of the guiding rails. They'd either have to start manufacturing spacers with retractable lugs, which would increase man hours spent on manufacturing each spacer, refit every minelayer with guiding rails that retract so you can remove the spacer, or dangle someone behind the ship to grab the spacer before it flies off, which would increase the time spent laying mixed minefields. They said in the video that sometimes one rail would be nothing but contact mines and the other nothing but tubes to avoid this issue while laying mixed fields.
for training I agree, they should have some kind of floats or radio beacons to recover them, in wartime it wouldn't matter as the "expendable" single use exploding mines are way more expensive then spacers but I understand your point (also would you really want to risk not just the remaining mines on board but the e tire ship and crew to go back into your brand new minefield to recover them? think of them like giant hand grenade pins or the safety caps on RPGs or the cloth satchels that houses the bricks of plastic explosives in pre assembled satchel charges
@@josephmontanaro2350 Well then you'd have to account for the manufacturing of the floats or radio buoys and the materials/time/effort used to recover the spacers. After all, these spacers probably haven't changed in design since WWI and they're probably WWII surplus at this point in history. It may be a waste, but it's infinitely safer and cheaper to not recover the spacers.
