There has been drama on board the Royal Navy’s HMS Queen Elizabeth off the Isle of Wight this afternoon (Wednesday) – less than 2 weeks after HMS Prince of Wales suffered a major breakdown whilst off Ventnor.
HMS Queen Elizabeth departed from Portsmouth at just gone 10:00 this morning, but just hours into her trip, a medical emergency on board has led to the deployment of HM Coastguard’s rescue helicopter.
Coastguard Rescue 175, based at Lee-on-Solent, has flown out to the flagship aircraft carrier to collect an unwell individual, who has since been flown directly to the helipad at Horsea Island.
It is assumed they are to be conveyed to the Queen Alexandra Hospital in Cosham, Portsmouth – or a suitable military medical establishment.
The £3billion, 66,000-tonne aircraft carrier is en route to undertake training with the US Navy and Royal Canadian Navy in place of the stricken HMS Prince of Wales, which suffered a major mechanical fault whilst a few miles off Ventnor at the end of August.
HMS Queen Elizabeth has been able to carry on with her journey and is making her way down the English Channel, heading West.
Meanwhile, HMS Prince of Wales has been moved around within Portsmouth Harbour as repairs get underway.
Why didn’t they fly the casualty back I. One of the planes – I assume some of those still work?
The aircraft on board an aircraft carrier are fighter aircraft, totally unsuitable for carrying a passenger.
Helicopters?
These are single seater fighters. I suppose you could try and strap thevpoor begger underneath
Are you joking?
“……a suitable military medical establishment”. No such place exists, all such establishments were closed by politicians years ago.
Queen Alexandra hospital Portsmouth is a joint military/civil establisment
There used to be Haslar, but going on my experience you would probably be better off in an NHS hospital.
Sometimes they fly the planes and helicopters on later on from Yeovilton, if not and she doesn’t carry any and she has to borrow one from the coastguard then we really in a mess.
Sorry but your wrong The Queen Elizabeth hospital in Birmingham
The QE hospital in B’ham is run by the NHS. There are no hospitals run by the military
didnt they jyst open a massive military hospital in london
Hang on, a ship that size should be able to deal with any medical emergency. Can’t organise a piss up in a brewery. Did you know, whilst the EU have been stock piling gas supplies we have been closing gas storage. If we loose any of our gas imports we’re screwed.
She is a warship, not a cruise liner. Sailing with a sick or injured crew member on board, consuming resources that may be needed if a real emergency occurs is just plain stupid.
It is eminently sensible to transfer such people ashore both for their own wellbeing and for the efficient running of the ship and her crew.
What do you think happens to sick people on a warship? Do you think that if you have a heart attack the medical officer will say “ no problem, we’ll have you back up and running in no time”. They will look after you for as long as it takes to get you ashore and transferred to a hospital, be it immediately in this case or longer if they are mid Atlantic. They ain’t a floating hospital.
What a pratt
Not necessarily it depends on what kind of casulty it is. If this is something that needs more medical intervention then they will fly the casulty off. Don’t just jump to conclusions.!!!!
Gas in the Uk is supplied mostly by EDF of France the gas to house holds in France are a lot lot lower than they charge the UK. EDF are robbing us blind and the deal we have allows them to charge the UK more !!
Is it a problem for our flagship to have its own helicopter???…..do they have no medical staffing that could escort the patient??….what will they do in a battle?….Putin must be laughing at us…
Get to know the reason first.
Agreed, perhaps it was a heart attack or something equally serious.
I hope he/she is doing well, whatever it was.
Correct, everyone guessing get to know the facts before commenting, the Captain or Chief Officer have a lot more knowledge of the casualtys problem than any of us and would make the right decision that’s why they are in command.
Yes, the Queen Elizabeth has helicopters. She has four Merlins.
While they could be used to evacuate a casualty, the Coastguard helicopter is specially designed and equipped for this task, whereas the Merlin is primarily a weapon platform.
There is also the issue that the ship would have to wait for her helicopter to return, while she could get under way as soon as the CG one had departed.
Putin is actually scared sh*tless of the QE, or, rather her compliment of F35s, as he has absolutely no effective defence against them.
Maybe you should give up posting as you are only succeeding in making yourself look a bigger plonker each time you do.
Oh yes.
Russian generals have nightmares about F35s. The closest the Russians can come to the F35 is the Su-57 (Russia’s “stealth” fighter). The Russians have only 16 of them and only 6 of those are in service. NATO has over 400 F35s in service.
The Su-57 isn’t even very stealthy (hence the quotes) with a Radar Cross Section (RCS) of between 10cm and 1m (the F35’s RCS is 5mm).
What really makes the F35 stand out is its sensor fusion system. What one sees, all see (including satellite and surveillance aircraft).
So you have an aircraft that is exceptionally hard to detect that can accurately target you without emitting any radiation (radar) itself.
The first time Ivan will know there’s an F35 about is when he goes kaboom.
Not much use for the f35’s when their flat top’s languishing on the sea bed after a hypersonic makes contact to say nothing of the nuke torpedoes at Russias disposal.I seriously doubt Vlad’s concerned by a hornby grade carrier.The Trident submarines will be more of a concern.
More stricken aircraft carriers will be along soon.
The air wing probably hasn’t arrived onboard yet so no helo’s
Surely the Helicopter would consume limited fuel resources which may be required in an emergency. If you can use a land based aircraft with ‘unlimited’ fuel resources then that is surely beneficial. Ships are isolated and don’t have a constant supply of aviation fuel….
You clearly don’t have an ounce of defence knowledge or experience and can’t fork sentences properly. Sit down.
Lot of people doing a lot of criticizing and have no idea of the circumstances.
I doubt it was just a bad cold but, yes, it is not at all unusual for a warship to transfer crew who are unfit for service ashore whenever the opportunity arises.
The navy can’t even evacuate one of their own , pathetic comes to mind!!!
Wolf you don’t actually have a clue about this subject. Sit this one out mate.
It’s most likely that there is a limited crew onboard whilst the ship undergoes repairs or waits for spare parts.
If somebody is sick or injured the coastguard was probably the closest and quickest way to evacuate.
It was the Prince of Wales that suffered the mechanical failure. This is the Queen Elizabeth.
Why didn’t they use an on board helicopter to transfer the patient if it was that serious,merlins have a great range and could of taken the crewmen quite easily.
The Coastguard helicopter may have already been in the air or, if not, is usually on standby for immediate take off as air-sea rescue is it’s primary purpose. It would likely be halfway to the ship before the QE had one of her helicopters prepped for take off.
As also pointed out (pays to read other comments before posting) the ship may not have embarked her own helicopters yet.
As also pointed out, the QE would have to wait for her own helicopter to return before departing whereas she could leave as soon as the Coastguard one had left her deck.
It wouldn’t be routinely fitted for casevac. If you have a specialist casevac fit aircraft available a few miles away. I don’t know what condition the patient was in, but they stood to receive better healthcare in the coastguard cab.
So nothing to do with HMS Queen Elizabeth directly. More to do with an unwell member of crew. Over dramatised headline!!
Maybe lubricating the prop shaft and got stuck inside
If she uses her own chopper she has to wait till it returns. Land chopper leaves ship returning to base, HMS Carrier hauls up and departs.