THE captain of the destroyer HMS Nottingham and three of his former officers were yesterday disciplined at a court martial after they pled guilty to their parts in causing the warship to run aground on rocks off Australia last year.
Commander Richard Farrington, 43, the captain of the type 42 destroyer, pled guilty to failing to delegate the responsibility of command of the ship properly.
He was sentenced to a reprimand - one of the lower navy court martial sentences - due to his charge not carrying any responsibility for the actual grounding.
His second in command, executive officer Lieutenant Commander John Lea, 38, and the officer of the watch, Lieutenant James Denney, 28, were both dismissed from their current ships after pleading guilty to negligence.
Lieutenant Andrew Ingham, 27, Nottingham's navigator, was sentenced to a severe reprimand after also pleading guilty to negligence.
The charges all related to allowing HMS Nottingham to be stranded off Lord Howe Island, Queensland, on July 7, 2002.
The resulting collision ripped a 100ft hole in the ship which caused a repair bill of (pounds) 39m and forced the Navy to bring the warship back to the UK on a transporter.
President of the court martial Commodore Phillip Wilcocks told all four defendants: ''This incident has undermined the high reputation of the Royal Navy and caused significant embarrassment, wasted resources, and took an operational warship out of active duty.
''Your punishments reflect the gravity of these offences.''
At the time of the grounding, HMS Nottingham was on a ''flag waving'' diplomatic mission and was heading towards New Zealand. The ship had left Cairns in northern Queensland on July 4 and would have been scheduled to arrive in New Zealand on July 11.
The court martial heard that the grounding of HMS Nottingham followed a series of late changes of direction to enable the evacuation of a sailor injured on board to Lord Howe Island off the coast of Australia. The change of plan forced the ship's team to replot a route to anchor to the north-east of the island, but the lieutenant commander and the two lieutenants failed to check the charts of the area. The new route caused the ship to head straight for Wolf Rock at a 12 knots.
The repaired warship is expected to be ready for sea trials next spring.
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