Sailors, Royal Marines and soldiers aboard the Royal Navy’s Caribbean patrol ship showed islanders in Grand Cayman how they can help if natural disaster strikes.
Amphibious support ship RFA Lyme Bay is on ‘hurricane watch’ for the next few months, ready to offer assistance to Britain’s overseas territories in the region if severe storms hit one of them.
Poised off the Cayman Islands’ capital George Town, the ship staged an exercise with authorities designed to show what Lyme Bay can do in an emergency and iron out any potential problems.
In addition to her crew of nearly 100 RFA sailors, the ship carries 23 Royal Navy sailors, 27 Royal Marines and Royal Engineers in a specialist disaster relief unit, and 18 soldiers from the Royal Logistics Corps – the latter are responsible for the Mexeflote powered rafts.
Those were in action during the exercise as the Lyme Bay team practised disembarking kit from ship to shore.
At the same time, her Lynx helicopter from 815 Naval Air Squadron was flying over the 76 square miles – about twice the size of Bristol – of Grand Cayman, scouting possible landing sites and routes on the ground which could be used to move disaster relief supplies around.
The five-day visit to the largest of the Cayman Islands allowed time for the ship’s Commanding Officer Capt Kim Watts RFA to host dignitaries, including Premier Alden McLaughlin and Governor Helen Kilpatrick, who collected a new staff car which Lyme Bay had brought out from the UK.
RFA Lyme Bay is on a six-month patrol of the Caribbean, focusing on counter-narcotics work alongside the region’s authorities, but always on stand-by to respond to a hurricane.
Before Grand Cayman the ship paid a brief visit to another British territory, Bermuda.
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Image: Royal Navy