Royal Navy survey ship returns from nine-month deployment

Royal Navy ship HMS Scott has returned to HM Naval Base Devonport after completing a nine-month, worldwide deployment.

As the only deep-water survey vessel in the Royal Navy, the ship deployed in June last year following an extensive refit last summer.

The captain of HMS Scott, Commander Karen Dalton-Fyfe, said: “It’s great to get home after a really successful period away. My guys have worked incredibly hard over the last nine months and can be extremely proud of all that we have achieved.”

HMS Scott has been conducting survey operations all over the North Atlantic and Mediterranean mapping an area equivalent to that of the UK. This involved steaming over 42,000 – miles the equivalent of going round the world one and three quarter times.

According to Royal Navy, HMS Scott will now spend a short period in Plymouth undertaking maintenance. It will sail again in the summer to continue surveying work.

The ship is fitted with a modern multi-beam sonar suite which permits mapping of the ocean floor worldwide and allows the sailors of HMS Scott’s survey department to collect and process navigational and deep-sea data from a strip of sea bed several kilometres wide – 150km2 of ocean floor every hour.

The final data is transformed into charts and sent to the UK Hydrographic Office in Taunton.

The crew operates a crew rotation system, in which 56 personnel are embarked for survey operations at any one time allowing for HMS Scott to be operationally available most of the year.

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