Colin Clarke – Impact of Perisher on rest of the crew

It’s hard work on the crew, trust me (laughs). So, that’s quite a tough time for the crew …

Simon: One, because the Captain is learning how to do it effectively, and you are kind of having to carry him a little bit?

Yeah, to a certain extent to start with , and you’d often be told by the Teacher to make life even more difficult for that trainee Captain as well. 

Simon: What misreporting or …?

Well, to some extent, a bit of misreporting or not reporting, or because they can get so fixated on the periscope, ‘cos they’re constantly looking at the periscope, making what they call an ‘eyes only attack’ then they’d start removing people from Watch Keeping positions in the Control Room.

I remember one of them where it got down to the Helmsman and Teacher in the Control Room. The Teacher had got rid of everybody else out of the Control Room …

Simon: And there would be normally how many people there?

Oh, at least half a dozen. So, he hadn’t even worked out that the guy raising and lowering the mast had gone.

It was incredible to watch actually, ‘cos the sonar on that boat at the time was in the corner of the Control Room and you could look out across the Control Room, although a diesel class Control Room was about the size of where we’re sat now realistically.

Two masts and then kit round the outside, but that corner over there, that would have been the centre and I was looking and there was just nobody and this guy was absolutely fixated on it.