THE NAVAL ENGINEER

2
London 2012 –
Engineers and Engineering
For many, the most memorable part of the summer of sport in 2012 was the Olympic opening ceremony. Others
recall the efforts of Olympic and Paralympic athletes in achieving their peak performances in many fields of sport,
whilst still others found themselves amongst the many thousands of individuals making the events run (as far as
the world-wide audience could see) smoothly and efficiently. In each of these spheres, RN engineers could be
found, some carrying out engineering functions and others participating or contributing in ways which had nothing
whatsoever to do with their professional role. To give a flavour of what was involved, here are some of their stories.
The Olympic
Flag
Ceremonial
Team
By Lt Jamie Weller
Lieutenant Weller, a Weapon
Engineer Officer from DE&S Abbey
Wood, was one of 16 specially
selected military personnel from
across Defence who were chosen to
raise the Union and Olympic Flags in
the Opening Ceremony of the 2012
London Olympics Games. A former
competitive gymnast with many
competition titles to his name, who,
upon retiring from competing, has
turned to dedicating his free time
to the British Schools Gymnastic
Association developing gymnastics
within schools across the country.
“The whole experience made
me immensely proud and I was
incredibly excited to be part of an
event that signalled the start of the
2012 Olympic Games. Even though
we spent weeks training for the
event, it still couldn’t prepare me for
the overwhelming euphoria that hit
Lieutenant Weller and his seven colleagues parade the Union Flag at the
Olympics Opening Ceremony
me as we started to march into the I was also fortunate to be selected
stadium. The atmosphere generated as I/C of the Naval ceremonial team
by 80,000 people was immense and at the O2 arena for the remaining
the noise levels were indescribable. period of the games, where the
Listening to all of those people team undertook ceremonial duties
cheering for you and knowing in the for 18 finals including Gymnastics,
back of your mind that you were live Trampoline, and Basketball. It was
in front of an estimated TV audience a privilege to represent the country
of four billion people. If I had made and my Service; being able to
a mistake or fallen out of step it participate in this once in a lifetime
would haunt me for the rest of my opportunity is something I will never
career!
forget.”
Ocean’s
Experience
By Cdr J.J. Bailey, Cdr (E)
and Lt Oli Fairbairn, SSEO
Preparing for and deploying on
Joint Operations is something
HMS Ocean and her Ship’s
Company have extensive
experience of; operating from open
sea, transporting an embarked force
into the littoral and flexing her Ship
to Objective Manoeuvre (STOM)
capabilities is what she does.
HMS Ocean deployed from Plymouth
to Greenwich, on the River Thames
on completion of an early summer
leave period, passing the Thames
Barrier inbound on Friday 13 July
2012 (!) without incident or more than
a few metres to spare. On station
the task was to operate helicopters
for both the Air and Maritime security
plans in support of the Metropolitan
Police and provide accommodation
for our TAG and up to circa 500
Venue Security Personnel (mostly
Army) as embarked forces who
made up the Venue Security
Force for the Greenwich Olympic
Equestrian site. The air group, for
the most part at five minutes notice
to launch, reducing to up to 45
minutes on occasions, provided
both Air STOP and Maritime STOP
capabilities to complement the high
speed interception capabilities of
the Eurofighter Typhoon squadron
forward deployed to RAF Northolt.
This meant support systems were
required to be maintained at, or very
near to, immediate notice in support
of aviation throughout the time on
task upriver of the barrier.