Midge Ure – Submarine got an ASBO

We had a particular draft. I was on HMS Superb, and we’d spent … it was fairly uneventful as far as submarine travels … the submarines had a particular problem in the reactor, and Rolls Royce were doing deep investigations, research into what was causing these problems on the reactor, which meant that the submarines were tied up alongside, had the Nuclear License taken off them, but they were still manned with a crew. There was still 150 people on that submarine, going down every day, being told “Well we’re not going anywhere, we’re not doing anything.”

We were working hard because I was the Engineer. We were down there working very hard and at some point we got the authority again, or the permission to flash the reactor back up and go and we ended up out in the Middle East, and we ended up going to a place called Diego Garcia, the atoll in the middle of the Indian Ocean and I’ve never seen anything like it.

It wasn’t the first run ashore we were on, but it was the first time we were out of the public … you’re almost in the middle of nowhere over there. Gibraltar is always pretty high profile, then through Diego Garcia and for some reason, I think there was a few, we called them Yanks, a few Americans over there ‘cos they hire the Base off us, there was a few Special Forces there, there was some ships in, there was some stuff so we weren’t the only ones there. Most of our people went ashore the first night, and for some reason it just all went wrong.

We had an ex-Paratrooper who had come across to be a Submariner, it was his first time, he went looking for these Special Forces to try and drink and ended up fighting with them all.

Somebody pulled the flag down off the Consulate building, there was fights in the Bar, somebody tried to steal a motorbike I think it was, and jet skis. It was an accumulation of offences.

So that was the first night I think ashore. The second and third and fourth there was more events happened.

I would like to say we were in for about 10 days, because we were in for quite a while, and what we had, we had a group of Engineers flying out from Faslane, to help with some issues we had on the submarine, so they flew out, al the civilian Engineers flew out and they were living in the same accommodation, drinking in the same Bars and all sorts of stuff.

Remember it’s just a small Naval Base there. When I say Bars, I mean the Mess or there was a NAAFI that you could buy bottles of vodka for £3 . That was the problem. You’re given a load of money, you’ve got time on your hands, you’re drinking.

It was party after party after party, and it got to a point where there were two or three things happened. One of the Engineers that worked for me at the time, I won’t give his name, but he thought it would be funny to try and get as smashed as he could, and then for some reason he tried to jump into the boot of a Police car.

When I say Police, it was the British Indian Ocean Territory Police, so they’re not military, they’re civilian but they’re for the military. He tried to jump into the boot of the car. He got into the boot, but unfortunately that’s where they keep their guns and their ammunition, so that was seen as a massive offence.

They pinned him down they were going to shoot, there was all sorts of hell kicking off that night, so he had to go to Court. When I say Court, it was a hastily put together group of people and they fined him $1000 within hours.

I mean literally we were only there … this happened in days, he got fined $1000 and told to remain onboard, so that got back to the Captain. 

Simon: So, the local authority fined him $1000 and then said, “You’re not welcome on land here.”

So, he was told, “You’re not welcome on our bit of land,” so he got sent back to the submarine. I think the Paratrooper, who’d gone out the first night and caused a load of trouble was pulled back onto the submarine and was not allowed shore leave for the rest of the period, and there was a few other incidents, people stealing stuff and doing stuff and setting fire.

There was a whole load of series of events that led to it, so what they ultimately did, they’d had enough of convening a Court every other day, they gave the submarine an ASBO.