SIXTH FORM

At the end of last term Miss Webb, Head of Sixth Form and Mrs Cole, Housemistress of Hatfield, took a very excited group of sixth formers to Plymouth for an exclusive tour of HMS Trenchant, one of our ‘adopted ships'. This is a nuclear submarine which was in the process of being refurbished ready to return to active service.

We were met by Lt. Matt Rees who had visited MSJ with his Commanding Officer, Irvine Lindsay, earlier in the year and so was a familiar face. Matt explained the layout of the sub and what we could and could not do and with hard hats in place we went aboard.

Trenchant is ‘home' to 165 men for four months at a time. There is less than minimal room to work, eat or rest. For the safety and survival of each man there are some very strict rules. No smoking; no contact with family or friends (that means no internet or mobile telephones) and strict silence. There are signs everywhere you look reminding everyone that ‘noise costs lives'!

Our tour began by examining the emergency exit which was a tube that came down and allowed one person at a time to enter and would seal and whisk you up to the top of the sub. The whole thing resembled a sausage in a skin and each time it returned there was more water inside it. Just like 007 in the James Bond movies!

We then went on to see and use various pieces of equipment including the periscope which the girls decided was ‘really cool', whilst the enormous cruise missiles and heavy weight torpedoes were positively mind-blowing. The gangways were only large enough for a person to walk through, whilst the ladders down to another level were vertical. The washing facilities were few and to use the toilet was known as going to the ‘heads'. The sleeping bunks were in layers of three and because of the lack of space between each one you would need to be in a horizontal position to enter into it. Not everyone has a bunk of their own. Whoever is not on duty sleeps and as soon as a bunk is vacated someone else enters. This is known as ‘hot bedding'. The bunks are only large enough to take a ‘body' there can be no turning over or around.

There are many similarities between living on a boat and in a boarding school. Each place houses a large number of people from different backgrounds for many months, within a relatively small area. Although of course the submarine's area is much smaller than ours and our lives do not depend quite so seriously on each other performing their given tasks!

Although both Matt and the Captain had described the conditions they all had to live and work in aboard Trenchant when they visited MSJ last year, our visit on Saturday brought it all alive for us and one has to admire and commend the stamina that is required of all the men who live and work in such a confined space and under such enormous pressure. Never again should we complain about the size of our kitchens!