First Aid.......

Steaming towards Ascension Island from the UK.

We have now settled into the routine. There are constant exercises - obviously, very necessary. An effective crew is one that has been well drilled. The aim is to practice for all eventualities - attack, fires, damage control, men overboard, aircraft ditches etc. As you can see, an awful lot can occur on board a Royal Navy ship.

So, although repetitive exercises can seem a drag it is clear that they are vitally important. You never know when you might be called upon to put into action all that practice.

One of my duties is to train the first aid teams. These sessions would usually be undertaken on the flight deck (when not in use for other things). Remember, the average age of the crew is around 19-20 years old. Sometimes it is difficult to get the first aid teams to take the training to seriously - their minds are often on their normal duties and I don't think that they really believe that they'll need first aid skills.

The light hearted approach to first aid training was to change quite dramatically. I always believed that it was highly likely we would suffer losses; the Argentinian forces weren't up to much, really. But, the law of averages were against us.

May 4th saw an event that changed the attitudes of my first aid teams to training and one that concentrated the minds of the whole crew. This was the day that HMS Sheffield was hit by Exocet and sunk with the loss of 20 crew. It was now, obvious to all, that this was a bloody serious situation that we approached.

To their credit, my first aid team members, paid serious attention to my lectures and training. Although not called upon to perform under fire, I have no doubt they would have performed admirably.