Navys’s Summer Extravaganza Draws Big Crowds
Around 35,000 visitors flocked to a sun-drenched Portsmouth Naval Base for the three-day Meet Your Navy extravaganza which ended on Sunday.
Organisers say the wide variety of attractions and displays plus the fine weather combined to make the event such a success.
Eleven Royal Navy ships – including aircraft carrier HMS Illustrious – were open to the public along with foreign navy vessels from Japan, Brazil, Chile, Denmark, and France.
As well seeing the present-day Royal Navy, visitors were taken back in time with historical drill and musket-firing displays and even demonstrations of tudor cooking in the Mary Rose replica galley.
And a glimpse to the future was also on offer in an exhibition featuring the Navy’s new Type 45 destroyers and aircraft carriers.
The many arena displays also proved a hit including Royal Marines from 40 Commando showing how to rescue a VIP. In a closely-fought field gun contest over the three days the Portsmouth Naval Base crew proved victorious, narrowly beating HMS Sultan from Gosport by an aggregate time of 13 seconds.
On the water the harbour displays also proved popular with crowds lining ships’ decks to see a fast-roping assault by 40 Commando Royal Marines and a search and rescue demonstration by the Royal navy’s 771 Squadron.
Naval Base Commander, Commodore David Steel, said: “Meet Your Navy has been a big success. The warm and sunny weather played a part but a big draw was seeing the Royal Navy’s ships and personnel at close hand. The event proved an exciting opportunity to show the general public the wide role of the Royal Navy and what its men and women are up to across the globe. The visitors showed a lot of interest in the role of the future Navy, in particular the new Type 45 destroyers and aircraft carriers – all to be based in Portsmouth.”
Robert Bruce, Managing Director of Portsmouth Historic Dockyard which jointly staged the event with the Naval Base, added: “We’ve been lucky with the weather but we were also pleased that the scale and variety of displays proved so popular.
“This was the operational navy and historic dockyard working together and the public were able to see how those two aspects of the Navy complement each other. It was not just about modern warships – all the historic attractions had many more visitors than is normal, even on a busy summer’s weekend.
“Meet Your Navy was the largest and most spectacular event in the Naval Base since Trafalgar 200 three years ago and we are delighted with the response from the public.”
