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RN officer Rory helps NATO hone anti-submarine warfare skills in Baltic

Swedish corvette Helsingborg passes HNoMS Maud
A hush comes over the bridge as the Officer of the Watch ‘gives a green’, focus is on the flight deck camera as figures appear on the screen to remove lashings from the aircraft.

to port.

At the same time, down in the operations room, an American voice crackles over the external network: a US Navy P-8 Maritime Patrol Aircraft has detected a contact on its systems; a flurry of activity follows: classification, designate a search and attack unit, increase the submarine threat warning.

You’re probably picturing a Type 23 frigate being bashed about in the Channel. Or maybe the Western Approaches – the standard operating procedures, language, and orders that any ops room or bridge personnel would know and recognise.

Except this is the Dutch frigate HNLMS Van Amstel, the helicopter just an NH90, callsign Neptune. 

The hunted is provided by one of NATO’s two new allies, Sweden. In their backyard, not ours: the Baltic.

Over four days the hunters – the ships of NATO’s Standing Group One (SNMG1) ­­– and hunted, submarine HSwMS Uppland, locked horns in the confines of the Baltic off Southeast Sweden to attune Sweden to NATO’s ways of working… and take advantage of the Swedes’ outstanding knowledge of these waters to broaden the expertise of the NATO force. 

Five NATO ships, plus Swedish corvettes, Swedish Air Force anti-submarine helicopters and long-range maritime patrol aircraft from the RAF, US Navy and French Marine Nationale were all trying to hunt down the ‘enemy below’.

The odds were firmly against the Uppland – but she’s small (two thirds the size of a Royal Navy Astute-class boat), a crew of just 35 souls, yet packed with up to 18 torpedoes to ruin any surface ship’s day.

Observing and advising was Lieutenant Commander Rory Hill, the RN officer assigned to the NATO group as its expert in anti-submarine warfare.

“The Baltic is very different from the North East Atlantic the NATO group often operates in – the water conditions affect sonar in different ways and the freezing temperatures require careful management of personnel and equipment,” he explained.

“Exercise Merlin was also the first time Sweden has taken part in anti-submarine activity as a NATO ally. This allowed a wide variety of training and integration including personnel exchanges between ships and the development of professional relationships and is a principal part of what Standing NATO Maritime Group 1 does.”

Lt Cdr Hill and the NATO staff are embarked in the group’s flagship, HNoMS Maud – a Norwegian variant of the Tide-class vessels serving with the Royal Fleet Auxiliary.

Working as part of an international staff has provided many opportunities from experiencing the subtle differences between navies to sharing information and making professional and personal connections with people from across the alliance. 

It was on the Maud that he planned the ‘attack’ on the Uppland, then co-ordinated by the anti-submarine warfare commander on the French frigate Auvergne, guided by an American P-8 with the Dutch NH90, armed with lightweight, dummy Mk46 torpedoes (a US-made counterpart to the Royal Navy’s Sting Ray), closing in for the kill. “This,” says Lt Cdr Hill, “is NATO working together at its finest.”

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