Chris Groves – Commanding small surface ships provides great lessons for later on

I think it doesn’t matter what size of ship or submarine for that matter, Command can be a pretty lonely place, and the ability to be able to lead in environments where things go wrong like at sea, is an incredible experience and really does prepare you for decision making and judgement I think going forward, so the near misses and incidents both from the personnel and from a ship perspective just helps you prepare and make you a better Officer in the future I think.

You gain much better to cut your teeth on a small ship like that, than perhaps a bigger ship, so I think it was a great preparation for me, and I was lucky to get it ‘cos not everybody did.

And just to be there as really the only experienced person to be able to make some of those decisions and judgements and to be on your own and have to do it yourself is a great, great preparation for what was to come. You know, when it came to driving a nuclear submarine later on and then being the Commander of an Aircraft Carrier.