Two Royal Navy warships today passed a milestone in their landmark mission to the Indo-Pacific region: five years deployed.
1,826 days have passed since sister patrol ships HMS Spey and Tamar – each crewed by around 50 sailors – left Portsmouth.
Since then, they have renewed the Royal Navy – and UK’s – presence across the region, the first British warships operating around-the-clock in this key part of the world since the handover of Hong Kong in 1997.
The anniversary comes with HMS Tamar in Malaysia joining a major US Navy humanitarian deployment, Pacific Partnership, having spent a week forging ties with the Cambodian Navy and people.
The mission of the two ships – Operation Highwall – is about as wide-ranging as it gets, from participation in major international naval exercises to providing disaster relief and humanitarian aid after disasters, helping regional navies and authorities police their waters to prevent smuggling, drug-trafficking or illegal fishing, and promoting military and economic ties with the UK.
They have helped to enforce UN sanctions imposed on North Korea by patrolling, conducted freedom of navigation missions in disputed waters, exercising their rights under UN law to sail through international waters, sometimes individually, sometimes in company with regional allies.
They were also the first Royal Navy vessels to visit Cambodia in more than half a century.
On paper, the ships’ patrol area extends from the eastern seaboard of Africa to the west coast of the USA. More typically they are found in Southeast Asia/Australasia and the western Pacific Rim, with each vessel generally operating independently.
HMS Spey, which has taken part in 14 international military exercises since leaving Portsmouth, was pressed into action almost as soon as she reached the region, delivering aid – especially water – to Tonga after a massive underwater volcanic eruption and tsunami in early 2022.
Work by her navigational team also determined that the remote British Pacific Territory of Henderson Island had been incorrectly marked on official charts for more than half a century and was around one mile out of position.
Spey has spent 15,259 hours at sea – that’s 636 days – travelling 161,133 nautical miles in the process. Her younger sister Tamar is just behind her: 159,000 nautical miles and 15,000 hours at sea. Collectively, the pair have sailed nearly 15 times around the world in the past five years.
Of the 125 places visited by Spey, among the more remote/obscure are: Tahiti, Vanuatu, Timor Leste, New Caledonia, and a string of island chains (Pitcairn, Solomon and Andaman).
To sustain themselves for so long thousands of miles from the nearest Royal Navy base, the ships have undergone maintenance in the ports and bases of our friends and allies in the Asia-Pacific region, especially Singapore – where HMS Spey is currently undergoing routine maintenance – and Cairns in Australia.
And crew changes take place every six or seven weeks (61 times in the case of HMS Spey so far), with personnel flying out from the UK to trade places with their shipmates so the vessels can maintain their demanding patrol schedules.