Br.Ant.Territory : Endurance Damage Could be £20 Million Plus?
Submitted by (Juanita Brock) 16.08.2009 (Article Archived on 30.08.2009)

Published on 14 August 2009, an article in the Portsmouth News stated that the taxpayer will have to pay at least £20m to fix HMS Endurance, raising fears that she will not return to sea again.

Photo (c) Photo Section MPC - HMS Endurance aboard M/V Target.

ENDURANCE DAMAGE COULD BE £20 MILLION PLUS?

An Editorial by J. Brock (FINN)

HMS Endurance aboard M/V Target

Photo (c) Photo Section MPC

Published on 14 August 2009, an article in the Portsmouth News stated that the taxpayer will have to pay at least £20m to fix HMS Endurance, raising fears that she will not return to sea again.

Going on to say that Portsmouth News has learned (from an as yet unidentified source) that the bill could top £30m to repair the HMS Endurance, “experts” are identified as saying huge pressure is on the Ministry of Defence budget meaning that the Navy is delaying a decision. 

Given the current world-wide financial crisis, budget constraints are obvious, not only for HMS Endurance but for all aspects of the Armed Forces.

The article goes on to indicate an as yet unidentified Royal Navy source said, “We're coming to the end of the survey work and it's becoming clear that it will cost at least £20m and that figure may be much higher depending on the contract negotiations.”

These ‘contract negotiations’ could mean anything from who’s going to do the work once the survey is completed and/or how much it is going to cost.  On-going negotiations traditionally are kept confidential by the MOD.

HMS Endurance nearly sank last December when her engine room flooded off the coast of Chile and, after a brief period of assessment in the Falkland Islands was, carried back to Portsmouth on the transporter ship MV Target in April.

Either the same or a different Royal Navy source said in a July 29 interview with Portsmouth News that “It has always been the Navy’s intention to repair Endurance but wanted to wait until the survey work is finished before making any announcement.”

The first named source for the article was Portsmouth South MP Mike Hancock, who sits on the Common's defence committee.  He said that a cost of £20m is right at the upper limit of what people will accept, and they will probably be annoyed that the Royal Navy has so far said nothing about such a large figure.

“If it's £30m I'm sceptical that they will be able to get the decision through because of budget pressures, which is why we aren't hearing anything,” he said.  “It is ridiculous but not surprising that the people who own this ship have been kept in the dark for so long and I will be asking questions about this, because four months is too long for news and that the Royal Navy said it was its intention to repair the ship, but we should be told what they are actually going to do.'

However, the questions won’t be asked until early October when Parliament returns from Summer Recess.

Secondly the article quotes Steve Bush, a former naval officer and editor of Warship World, who said the navy might remove Endurance from service altogether. “The cost of repairing Endurance is high when you consider how much competition there is for funding in the MoD and they may try to remove Endurance because she's expensive, but when we removed the last Endurance Argentina invaded the Falklands,” he said.

An investigation has been carried out into the cause of the incident but it is not known if a final inquiry into the near-sinking will be announced. 

Endurance will be replaced by HMS Scott for the next working period in Antarctica.

http://www.portsmouth.co.uk/newshome/Endurance-bill-reaches-20m.5555182.jp