RN Concept Designs: HMY(R), Replacement Royal Yacht

[RP1]

So, another one from the depths of Profs' acetates (he still uses the OHP! )


This time, it's a replacement for HMY Britannia, which was studied on-and-off for a while in FBG before finally being nixed by the New Labour government in 1997.

Annoyingly I can't make out the signature. This artist was, IIRC, one who Profs' projects used quite often. I think his name was Donnelly, but I will check sometime with the boss.

[Edity-edit: I found the 2.5K version. "Ken Donnelly, NCSD", which was the department of painting, or something like that.]

RP1

 

[Arjen]

Very nice. I've always liked the shape of Britannia, because it looks like a miniature Transatlantic liner of the thirties. Just looking at the outside, this would have made a proper replacement.

 

[Yellow Palace]

I had to do a double-take, that's far too attractive a yacht for the 1990s!

So, another one from the depths of Profs' acetates (he still uses the OHP! )

I had a lecturer like that. He shuffled back from retirement this year. Also did the GA of the Type 23s, has a wealth of stories....

 

[Grey Havoc]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1XPHL4Q86t4&feature=player_detailpage

 

[Hobbes]

So, another one from the depths of Profs' acetates (he still uses the OHP! )


This time, it's a replacement for HMY Britannia, which was studied on-and-off for a while in FBG before finally being nixed by the New Labour government in 1997.

That looks just like the old HMY Britannia. Was there no desire to move to a more modern design?

 

[RP1]

That looks just like the old HMY Britannia. Was there no desire to move to a more modern design?

It's *very* similar in external appearance. I think it had a large flight deck, though. IIRC there was an active desire to maintain the appearance, which was regarded as being classic.


There was a design by 3 Quays, which I have an illustration of, with more modern stylings. I'm not sure if it actually looks better. There was also a trimaran design done at MoDs behest by a student design group at UCL.


RP1

 

[uk 75]

RP 1 I love the Prof's acetates. Any chance of any more?

On the Royal Yacht I have somewhere some newspaper cutting from about 1997 showing various ideas and proposals for a replacement ship. The problem seems to have been that a traditional like for like design as shown here did not fit the new Government's "Cool Britannia" ideas for promoting Britain overseas (one of the key roles in peacetime of the Yacht). We also know from Peter Hennessy's Secret State that the Cold War role for the Yacht as a more dignified UK 1 sailing around the Islands of Scotland (convenient that HM the Queen loved practising this in peacetime) to preserve the chain of command after her realm had been annihilated no longer featured once the threat of general war with the Soviet Union ended.

The more modern designs suffered in that they resembled the "floating gin palaces" of Gulf rulers and later on Russian Oligarchs. Later when the Royal Yacht was no longer available there were no shortage of such ships being offered to the Government to be leased or borrowed for the times when they might be needed.

It is also tempting to note that with the handover of Hong Kong in 1998 there was no British possession East of Suez to act as a backdrop to the yacht. That handover was Britannia's last gasp of Empire before the long twilight of European mediocrity...

 

[Grey Havoc]

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2017/01/05/build-new-royal-yacht-britannia-deliver-20-year-old-conservative/

 

[Grey Havoc]

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2017/03/14/liam-fox-backs-campaign-new-britannia-saying-would-love-trade/

 

[FighterJock]

That would be a good idea designing and building a successor replacement boat for the Britannia. One question though, what would we call the new ship? Britannia 2?

 

[Hood]

On the Royal Yacht I have somewhere some newspaper cutting from about 1997 showing various ideas and proposals for a replacement ship.

I think that may of been The Times, I did keep a cutting but I've lost it since. If I remember it was inspired by sailing ships and had three masts married with a modern sleek yacht style. I can't remember if it was just the paper's own musings or something actually proposed.

 

[Hobbes]

That would be a good idea designing and building a successor replacement boat for the Britannia. One question though, what would we call the new ship? Britannia 2?

The new ship would be the 85th royal yacht, so there's plenty of names to recycle if that's what they want. Only 2 on that list were named Britannia.

Like naval ships, a second ship with the same name won't get a numeric suffix (CVN-65 is not called USS Enterprise VI).

 

[TomS]

That would be a good idea designing and building a successor replacement boat for the Britannia. One question though, what would we call the new ship? Britannia 2?

The new ship would be the 85th royal yacht, so there's plenty of names to recycle if that's what they want. Only 2 on that list were named Britannia.

Like naval ships, a second ship with the same name won't get a numeric suffix (CVN-65 is not called USS Enterprise VI).

Of course not. Everyone knows it should be Enterprise-F.

 

[DWG]

what would we call the new ship? Britannia 2?

Given the way things are going, Anglia.

 

[Foo Fighter]

They will probably have to go with an industry name, seeing as they will be paying the piper. Something like the football stadia here so so "Wimpy blimpmobile" or such wonder.

 

[Pirate Pete]

Vessel nicknamed 'Dartania' - PFI (Private Finance Initiative) project:

 

[Pirate Pete]

Re-The sailing ship version mentioned - found this Daily Mail item:

 

[Pirate Pete]

Lastly, the project to replace Victoria and Albert just prior to WW2.
From "Rebuilding the Royal Navy" by George Moore. Apologies for image quality:

 

[Hood]

pf Matthews,
The sailing ship in The Times was much more handsome!

 

[TomS]

pf Matthews,
The sailing ship in The Times was much more handsome!

This one, perhaps?

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/09/22/revealed-details-of-secret-naval-plans-for-a-new-100million-roya/

Edit: not sure why the thumbnail isn't showing up for the attached version.

 

[starviking]

Lastly, the project to replace Victoria and Albert just prior to WW2.
From "Rebuilding the Royal Navy" by George Moore. Apologies for image quality:

Are there different editions of "Rebuilding the Royal Navy" by Brown and Moore? My copy definitely does not have any Royal Yacht projects in it.

 

[Pirate Pete]

Soory, my error.
The book is: Building for Victory by George Moore :-[

 

[starviking]

Soory, my error.
The book is: Building for Victory by George Moore :-[

No problem! It's the precursor to "Building the Royal Navy", right? I will have to get my hands on it.

 

[Pirate Pete]

Morre's "Building for Victory" is a stand alone book which covers the construction plans and programmes of the British Navy just prior to and through to the end of the Second World War. "Rebuilding the Royal Navy" is the last part of the DK Brown series which runs through a series of four volumes "Warrior to Dreadnought", "Building the Grand Fleet", "Nelson to Vanguard", and of course "Rebuilding the Royal Navy". There is a further book by Brown "Before the Ironclad", which I believe was not part of the original set, but dove-tails nicely as a first part of the "series".

 

[Grey Havoc]

Boris Johnson urged to back new Royal Yacht Britannia as memorial to Prince Philip

MPs, Cabinet ministers and former Britannia captain back calls for successor to be named HMY The Duke of Edinburgh

www.telegraph.co.uk

Honouring Prince Philip with a Royal Yacht Britannia replacement would be an enduring tribute

During the Duke’s life of service, he travelled more than 70,000 miles in Britannia and completed two circumnavigations of the world in her

www.telegraph.co.uk

 

[DWG]

Boris Johnson urged to back new Royal Yacht Britannia as memorial to Prince Philip

MPs, Cabinet ministers and former Britannia captain back calls for successor to be named HMY The Duke of Edinburgh

www.telegraph.co.uk

Honouring Prince Philip with a Royal Yacht Britannia replacement would be an enduring tribute

During the Duke’s life of service, he travelled more than 70,000 miles in Britannia and completed two circumnavigations of the world in her

www.telegraph.co.uk

Renaming the Britannia Royal Naval College*, which I've also seen suggested, would be substantially cheaper!

* UK version of Annapolis, and where the Queen and Duke first met.

 

[timmymagic]

To any forum users outside of the UK it should be said that there really is no public support or political will for a new Royal Yacht whatsoever (definitely not within the RN either who would hate to have to man her...). Any Government that attempted to commission one using public funds would be absolutely crucified, every leak of photo's of an opulent interior would cost lots of votes, running costs would be scrutinised and compared to nurses salaries etc, just endless political negativity for no real gain.

 

[Grey Havoc]

Exclusive: Commemorative £5 coins could be issued to pay for Prince Philip memorial

Special 'crowns' could be used to pay for a statue or even go towards a new Royal Yacht Britannia in memory of Duke of Edinburgh

www.telegraph.co.uk

 

[PMN1]

How about a design with a long unobstructed flat deck for 'recreation or putting up of marquees', that can also carry a lot of 'guests' and their 'vehicles'

 

[Foo Fighter]

Give it a notional military value and you might sell it, after all, selling UK business was the major role when sailing to distant shores.

 

[uk 75]

We now know (thanks to Prof Peter Hennessy) that "Britannia" had the same role for the UK as Air Force One. In crisis or war it provided for the Monarch and her closest advisers to cruise in the protected waters of Scotland and ride out the crisis to preserve the UK's command authority.
By 1997 this role had passed into history.

 

[Grey Havoc]

By 1997 this role had passed into history.

Or so they thought.

In other news, looks like Project Leith, aka the 'trade and investment ship', is going to be moving ahead after all:

Exclusive: Britannia to rule the waves once more, with new royal yacht named after Prince Philip

Boris Johnson to announce new national flagship within weeks, with the £200m vessel to serve as an official tribute to the Duke of Edinburgh

www.telegraph.co.uk

 

[uk 75]

Or they could just paint up a T45 like this one

https://www.secretprojects.co.uk/threads/rebranding-the-royal-navy.37087/post-454429

 

[Grey Havoc]

You'll give desperate beancounters ideas, shame on you!

 

[Tony Williams]

A couple of pics of a Lurssen publicity stunt from a few years ago. Apparently some potentates from the Middle East were quite interested - they didn't realise it was a joke. In practice, there are of course all sorts of restrictions applying to where warships can dock...

 

[Hood]

Or so they thought.

In other news, looks like Project Leith, aka the 'trade and investment ship', is going to be moving ahead after all:

This has to be the dumbest political canard I have seen for a while and that's saying something. The Twitter and press reactions don't seem positive at all.
How can a Royal Yacht boost national trade and attract investment? By ferrying an old lady around to former bits of the Empire that would quite likely want rid of her? I think her days of globetrotting are coming to an end so its pretty pointless. Maybe King Charles can spend £2bn remodelling it into an eco-friendly Napoleonic-era sloop when he takes the throne? Prince William can go yachting to see his exiled brother in LA? Or is it really so future Tory PMs and Cabinet Ministers can swan around at Monte to meet their dodgy sponsors down at the casinos?

Meanwhile the RN who can't find enough manpower have to decide whether to man this yacht or a frigate.
Maybe we could a Soviet AGI job and make a duplicate role as a secret floating AI Agency/Royal Cyber Corps floating HQ befitting a Bond film?

 

[uk 75]

You mentioned Soviet AGI. Vlad liked the idea

Vladimir Putin's life of LUXURY revealed in stunning pictures

www.dailystar.co.uk

 

[uk 75]

The USA meanwhile knew the game was up back in 1977 and retains this charming relic in marked contrast to the faded pomp of HMY Britannia in Leith.

USS Sequoia (presidential yacht) - Wikipedia

en.m.wikipedia.org

 

[Foo Fighter]

I must be old because I really like the idea of a royal yacht, given that her secondary role of hospital ship would be of more use these days for disaster relief etc. Something of a civil and warship hybrid also has its draw factor. The vessel would need to be able to defend itself at very least.

 

[TomS]

I must be old because I really like the idea of a royal yacht, given that her secondary role of hospital ship would be of more use these days for disaster relief etc. Something of a civil and warship hybrid also has its draw factor. The vessel would need to be able to defend itself at very least.

Britannia supposedly had a secondary role as a hospital ship. But when actual wars happened where a hospital ship was needed (Falklands most obviously), she was nowhere to be seen.

Also, hospital ships cannot be armed and still get Geneva protections.