[155], Plans to replace Melbourne changed in July 1981; the British 1981 Defence White Paper had marked the recently commissioned HMSInvincible as surplus to requirements, and she was offered to the RAN for the 'bargain' price of GB175million (A$285million). Left: Lady White unveils Melbourne's ship's badge. [23] Melbourne was capable of being reactivated as a helicopter-equipped anti-submarine warfare carrier within 26 weeks, but was never required to do so. She arrived in Sydney on 9 July. [45] Melbourne operated a standard air group of four Skyhawks, six Trackers, and ten Wessex helicopters until 1972, when the Wessexes were replaced with ten Westland Sea King anti-submarine warfare helicopters and the number of Skyhawks doubled. [59], Following a working-up period in British waters, Melbourne departed Glasgow on 11 March 1956 on her maiden voyage to Australia via the Suez Canal. Two days prior to that, one of Melbourne's Gannet aircraft developed an engine fault on take off and ditched into the sea ahead of the ship. [50][51], Over the course of her career, over thirty aircraft were either lost or heavily damaged while operating from Melbourne. South China Sea early morning 3 June 1969 aftermath scene of the HMAS Melbourne and USS Frank E Evans collision. The Gannets crew, Lieutenant David Farthing, RAN, Lieutenant Graham Bessell-Browne, RAN, and Petty Officer Frederick McCreanor, were quickly recovered by helicopter, somewhat shaken but otherwise unhurt. SLT Crew Cab Short Box 4WD. [86], Melbourne struck Voyager just aft of the destroyer's bridge, rolling the destroyer to starboard before cutting her in half. Early in her career, Melbourne underwent a series of short annual refits, commencing in September and ending in January or February of the next year. [169] Another anchor and the starboard side ship's bell are on display at the RAN Heritage Centre at Garden Island. [98][99] This is the only time in Australian history two Royal Commissions have been held for a single incident. [84] The procedure to accomplish this required Voyager to turn away from Melbourne in a large circle, cross behind the carrier, then take position off Melbourne's port side. Following temporary repairs at Singapore, Melbourne returned to sea on 27 June bound for Australia. [105][106] As the carrier was optimised for anti-submarine warfare, there was little need for her at the start of the war. Melbourne's first major refit started in December 1967 and continued until February 1969, during which she was upgraded to operate S-2 Tracker and A-4 Skyhawk aircraft. Melbournes journey back to Sydney was notable for the Melbourne-Sydney Marathon. En route, on 2 August, she participated in the search for survivors from the collier Birchgrove Park which had foundered north of Port Jackson the previous night resulting in the loss of ten lives. [134] The refit concluded in late 1971, with the carrier participating in the first RIMPAC exercise, RIMPAC 71, before the end of the year. [77] The carrier's annual refit began in Sydney on 1 October. Ironically, the following day Melbourne celebrated her 20,000th landing when Lieutenant Ryland Gill, RAN, landed his Gannet on board. She has bn innocent, never once bowed to the natural or human force, in spite of the heavy storm n the talked abt jinx. [117], On the night of 23 June 1969, Melbourne and her escorts were involved in anti-submarine training exercises in the South China Sea. [10] As the carrier neared completion, a commissioning crew was formed in Australia and first used to return Vengeance to the United Kingdom. [107] Utilising the carrier was suggested again by RAN officials in March 1966, when the United States Seventh Fleet was having difficulties maintaining anti-submarine patrols around Yankee Station, but Melbourne could only remain on station for a single, ten-day period, a third of the time that US carriers were operational for on rotating deployments. [114] A radio message was sent from Melbourne to Evans' bridge and Combat Information Centre, warning the destroyer that she was on a collision course, which Evans acknowledged. [101] Robertson and the other officers of Melbourne were absolved of blame for the incident. A New Guinean sailor from HMAS Tarangau spends some time on board HMAS Melbourne during one of the flagship's visits to New Guinea. The disaster resulted in the loss of 82 lives - 14 officers, including the Commanding Officer, Captain Duncan Stevens, himself a former Executive Officer of Melbourne, 67 sailors and one civilian dockyard employee. [114] Stevenson held a dinner for the five escort captains at the start of the exercise, during which he recounted the events of the MelbourneVoyager collision, emphasised the need for caution when operating near the carrier, and provided written instructions on how to avoid such a situation developing again. [148] The carrier's deployments for the second half of the year consisted of two exercises, Sea Hawk and Kangaroo 81. Serving in the RAN's flagship had its benefits when it came to recreational activities and keeping fit, with Melbourne's flight deck providing an excellent sporting platform, circa May 1969. Work progressed slowly thereafter and many lessons learnt during the war regarding carrier design and operations were incorporated into the ship's modernisation programme. Work resumed on Melbourne in 1949 at which time it was decided to increase the size of the flight deck lifts to accommodate the larger aircraft coming into service. [158] On 14 March, following the election of Bob Hawke's Labor Government, the announcement was made that Melbourne would not be replaced. [123] All of the survivors were located within 12 minutes of the collision and rescued before half an hour had passed, although the search continued for fifteen more hours. A Skyhawk coming over Melbourne's round-down. Melbourne in San Francisco Bay with the Golden Gate Bridge in the background. She participated in the inaugural ANZUK naval exercise GENESIS at the end of March and departed Singapore for Australia on 3 April. On 28 October, 1955, the ship was officially named and commissioned into the RAN as HMAS Melbourne under the command of Captain Galfrey GO Gatacre, DSO, DSC, RAN, while Lady White, wife of Sir Thomas White, the then Australian High Commissioner in the United Kingdom, performed the naming ceremony. Laid down for the RN as HMS Majestic on 15 April 1943 and launched in 1945, the ship was nearing completion when construction was virtually brought to a halt with the cessation of wartime hostilities. Thompson and Potts were both killed when their Sea Venom crashed into the sea in 1956. Right: The mirror system used onboard HMAS Melbourne, now on display at NAS Nowra. The scrapping was delayed so Melbourne could be studied by the People's Liberation Army Navy (PLAN) as part of a secret project to develop a Chinese aircraft carrier and used to train PLAN aviators in carrier flight operations. [95] A Royal Commission into the events of the collision was held in 1964, and found that while Voyager's crew was primarily at fault for neglecting to maintain an effective lookout and awareness of the larger ship's location, Melbourne's bridge crew was also at fault, for failing to alert Voyager and not taking measures to avoid the collision. The PLAN subsequently arranged for the ship's flight deck and all the equipment associated with flying operations to be removed so that they could be studied in depth. [19], The main modifications centred around the need to operate jet aircraft, which were larger and heavier than those propeller-driven aircraft that the carrier was originally designed for. Blue exterior, Brown interior. The fleet made its way northwards to the Philippines over the course of the exercise which concluded with a fly-over of aircraft over Manila. [139] A two-seat Harrier jump jet demonstrator undertook a series of trial takeoffs and landings aboard Melbourne on 30 June: a trial organised as part of the project overseeing the ship's potential replacement. [147] On 24 October, a Tracker from Melbourne observed Soviet warships Storozhevoy and Ivan Rogov shadowing the squadron. [16] The size of the ship's company averaged 1,350 officers and sailors, including 350 personnel from the embarked Fleet Air Arm squadrons. On 27 March she contributed to Exercise SHOWPIECE off Singapore designed to impress upon the political and military leaders of the region the continued strength and readiness of the British Far East Fleet. [67][68] The carrier spent the rest of the year visiting Australian ports for open inspections by the public. It was decided that two of the Majestic Class, HM Ships Terrible and Majestic, would be taken over by the RAN and named Sydney (III) and Melbourne (II) respectively. 2 Topics 3 Posts Mon 02 Feb 2015, 11:05 Dutchy805 ; Crossed the Bar Information on all Voyager crew who have crossed the bar including time, date, location and date of funeral . The National Archives holds these in Canberra in the record series A4624. Melbourne departed Pearl Harbor on 25 November and arrived back in Sydney, via Suva, on 10 December. [136] While working up following the refit, Melbourne and HMASTorrens provided assistance to MV Miss Chief off the coast of Bundaberg, Queensland on 16 August 1976. Crew members aboard HMAS Vampire. The original message reads: "1942 design" light aircraft carrier program, "HMAS Sydney (III): a symbol of Australia's growing maritime capability", "Official apology for HMAS Melbourne captain", "Navy Marks 109th Birthday With Historic Changes To Battle Honours", "Royal Australian Navy Ship/Unit Battle Honours", "China's aircraft carrier ambitions: seeking truth from rumours", A sailor's recollections of several tours of duty aboard the carrier, Royal Australian Navy School of Underwater Medicine, Battle honours of the Royal Australian Navy, Royal Australian Navy Helicopter Flight Vietnam, List of warship classes of the Royal Australian Navy, List of aircraft carriers of the Royal Navy, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=HMAS_Melbourne_(R21)&oldid=1139894305, Majestic-class aircraft carriers of the Royal Australian Navy, Short description is different from Wikidata, Use Australian English from February 2014, All Wikipedia articles written in Australian English, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License 3.0, Two Parsons single-reduction geared turbine sets; four Admiralty, Latin: "She Gathers Strength As She Goes", Standard: 15,740 long tons (17,630 short tons), Full load: 20,000 long tons (22,000 short tons), 12,000 nautical miles (22,000km; 14,000mi) at 14 knots (26km/h; 16mph), 6,200 nautical miles (11,500km; 7,100mi) at 23 knots (43km/h; 26mph), Navy Engineering, Regulation, Certification and Safety, Royal Australian Navy Tridents Rugby League Team, This page was last edited on 17 February 2023, at 11:52. [124] After Evans' stern was evacuated, it was cast off, while the carrier moved away to avoid damage. Melbourne went on to visit New Guinea, the Philippines, Japan, Hong Kong and Singapore before returning to the Philippines to participate in the SEATO exercise SEADOG in July. Duties: The six most seriously injured survivors were transferred to Balmoral Naval Hospital by helicopter the following day, while others remained aboard Melbourne until she returned to Sydney on 12 February. [4] Work progressed on Majestic at a slower rate, as she was upgraded with the latest technology and equipment. In 1922 the Melbourne was involved in a dramatic rescue of the crew of an American schooner in the Tasman Sea, at the height of a hurricane. [1][56] A decision was made in 1959 to restrict Melbourne's role to helicopter operations only, but was reversed shortly before its planned 1963 implementation. 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