The Malloys at Large: A Day at Sea with HMCS Calgary

One of the unique experiences we had at the reunion was a day spent aboard the Canadian Frigate HMCS Calgary. This is not a trivial sized ship.

Approximately 150 of us boarded, and then went to sea. I was a little impressed at what is considered normal security at the stern of the ship.

The first thing the captain demonstrated were the tight turns the ship was capable of making. If you didn't get your sea legs here, you never were.

It really was an amazing demonstration.

After all our gyros were toppled, we went to a number of different stations to learn parts of the ship's function.

Our first lesson was the standard weaponry used by boarding teams tasked with searching other ships. (HMCS Calgary was successful in boarding a Somalian pirate ship and seizing all their weapons.)

Then we learned about the equipment used by the ship's divers. Very heavy.

We also got a chance to look at their firefighting equipment, and even got to test holding the water hose. You had to be strong.

We went down into the depths of the ship into the operations room.

And up onto the bridge.

Then we got a magnificent demonstration of firefighting in the hold of the ship. Apparently they used a little kitchen grease to get a bunch of smoke in a contained room. In come the firefighters, who use thermal imaging to determine the source of the fire and chances of a an injured individual before opening the door. Out came a lot of smoke. They ostensibly hosed it down and cleared the problem. Once the demonstration was over, I was impressed to see who the Crew Chief was.

Another dramatic demonstration was that of "Man Overboard". They set out flares marking the location of the dummy, the ship turned in an extremely tight circle and then came to a full stop, a crew drove out and rescued the poor wet dummy. Their goal is recovery within 5 minutes and they certainly met the standard on this one.

All of this energy required a filling lunch.

After lunch the best was yet to come. The frigate actually holds a Sea King Helicopter, and
we had lunch on the flight deck.

Just after lunch, we were happily relaxing when a Sea King Helicopter buzzed the ship. (The Air Force apparently really likes to do this to the Navy.)

After we all got first aid for shock, the Sea King crew proceeded to set markers, throw three people out into the water, and then recover them. The most impressive part of the demonstration was how the pilot kept the aircraft almost motionless again the sea, apparently an extremely difficult feat.