Cock-ups when we were young and green.

[SONAR-BENDER]

I was reading something else, somewhere else, which sent me on a rambling memory trip reminding me of the following tale. When we were young, and on occasions, not so young, we have all made cock-ups. Some monumental. some small. Some funny, some disastrous. As the statute of limitations has passed by now, let's 'fess up here for the delight and delictation of others!

I'll kick things off with this one:

For some reason, I was 19 or 20 and ashore in Nelson (NOT DQs!!), and must have been Buffer's Party or similar, as it was a gash hand job. One Friday morning, myself and A N Other were specially selected to go to the Regulator's Mess to prepare for the Friday Meat Raffle. On our arrival at the hallowed doors, we were sent off to some little side kitchen jobby, where we were tasked with making hundreds of sandwiches for the Crushers and their dogs (Geddit?)

You can imagine it - soft white bread, hard butter, time flying by - things were not going well. However, despite being a Dabber at the time, I had O Levels and Leadership potential - so I used my initiative..... I figured that if we melted the butter and used a paint brush we'd found (don't ask - no idea after all this time!) to put it on the bread, we'd crack the job in no time!

Well, it worked a treat and before long we'd got through several loafs of Mother's Pride finest and had a few tall stacks of buttered soft white bread. It was at this point we discovered that molten butter quickly solidifies, and what we actually had were several ugly, leaning towers of solid bread and butter! GULP!

We started desperately trying to separate the welded slices, leaving broken bits of buttered bread all over the shop. It then became obvious that it was probably going to be easier to start on the most recent/moist slices. At this point a RPO came in to see how we were doing......

I truly can't remember the final outcome, just that the final sandwich level was about 50% of what it should have been and that we didn't get invited into the Mess for a pint or ever asked to make sarnies again! Result!

 

[Dredd]

a gash hand job.

Yes, I think I've met her as well.

 

[Joint_Force_Harrier]

(Around 98) Went down town Helston on a Sunday Lunchtime for a few and got back to Culdrose just in time for evening Scran. Being a young thruster I had my going ashore starboard ear ring in. I got to the counter, loaded up my plate and the PO Caterer (still know the cnuts name) called me over....

"Do you know you are contriving Culdrose standing order blah, blah, blah?, what your name rank and number?".

I gave him my name and noticed he had written something down different, winner I though, so made up a rate and service number... He told me to report to RPO (Bloggs) in the morning.

Obviously I never went to the reg office until I got a call on Thursday morning from the reggies asking where I was on Monday. Luckily I was on Guard and training all week up at the range.

Popped over to the Reg office and my old Reggie off 820 Squadron was there...

"Come in, sit down, right this is a list of things I could charge you with. Giving false details, disobeying an order (got away with that somehow), the standing order bit blah, blah", he said.

I had dirt on this guy from our time on the squadron and he knew it, he told me to get out and never darken his door again.

Turns out the PO Caterer saw me in my 8's shirt so found out my real name

I will find him one day.......

 

[taffscrivs]

On Eskimo during refit at Chatham must have been '72, the Chief Stoker was one John Perrin, a big stout affable bloke. we were in the office one morning and he's giving his version of Sgt Esterhaus' Hill St Blues morning roll call (remember that? great show, all episodes still available on All4) when he mentioned that too many frivolous request forms were landing on his desk. Later in the day me being duty joker wrote out a request form, asking; Dear Large Cuddly One, can I have the weekend off to go on the pop up The Smoke. I was soon summoned to his office where without a word he handed me back my request form and written on the bottom in block capitals was; NO YOU F*CKING CAN'T! Then it was, 'Out you cheeky bastard you are now in shit street for a month.'
And being a good Chiefy he made sure I was....

 

[WreckerL]

As a JR on an S boat I was sent to clean a salinometer probe on a fresh water system in the diesel room. For those that don't know, the probe measures the conductivity and. hence purity, of the water in the system. To remove the probe you have to wind the probe valve shut which then makes the probe come out of the pocket.

This particular probe was on the Reactor Compartment Fresh Water System and if the valve doesn't shut fully then you get oggin shooting out. This particular probe the valve had partially failed so when I unscrewed the probe a fountain of hot FW followed it, spraying all over the 300KW MG next to it. You can't get the probe back in in this scenario so I had to act as a shield to the MG, getting a good soaking.

By this time the header tank had drained down, tripping the pump and causing alarms to go off all over the place. My oppo, a killick stoker, came down and isolated the pump and sorted it out (I couldn't move as the water would hit the running MG).

When I went up to manouvering the Chief Tiff took one look at me soaking wet and said "You c**T, what happened there", I explained and he just said "fair enough but your still a c**t, don't bother drying off, with all that water sloshing around the plates in the diesel room, once you've pumped the bilge you can scrub out"

What I learnt from that was if the probe (once unscrewed) starts to come out of the pocket of it's own accord then push it back down quickly as the valve is passing!!

 

[LifebuoyGhost]

Memory is a bit hazy after all this time but the gist of this is gen.
Early on the morning watch on the Hubberston and OOW appears - it's the MCDO Lt George Dance who is sadly no longer with us. George was a big geordie with a booming voice and an all round good hand.

"LBG go and make me an egg sarnie I'm starving " sayd George. "Certainly Sir" says I and disappears of to the galley. The galley is in darkness with just the red night lights in the passageway and galley. I gets the frying pan out and drops some cooking oil in from the 5 litre tin I'd found - the chef was still in his pit .

Cooks a couple of eggs, slaps them two slices of bread and whisks them up to George on the bridge. He takes a bite and the next thing I hear is 200Db of "What the fuck is this LBG". I'm a little put out by his ingratitude but when he says it tastes funny and asks for another off I go to the galley again.

I'm just about to repeat the operation when I notice the 5 litre tin of "cooking Oil" says TeePol on the side - well it was dark and the middle of the night and I may have been lacking a bit of concentration at the time.
Oh dear thinks I - that would explain why the eggs didn't sizzle very much last time.
Luckily George took it in his stride when I explained it to him - and I did make him a proper egg sarnie in the end. All's well that ends well.

 

[Alfacharlie]

Bit of a long one, but a safeguard dit and monumental fuck up.

2000 on HMS Monmouth. Halfway through 6 month Gulf deployment. I was an OM(AW)1, just passed for killick and awaiting killicks course on return to Guzz.

Another routine visit to Bahrain, for stores, getting shiters etc. and It was the last night, therefore we were under sailing orders, (you can probably see where this is heading).
I usually volunteer for duties on the last day but for some reason I was off.
All day I was adamant not to be going out, instead I’d just chill out in the mess with a few beers in the fridge. I think it took about half hour of lads saying “shall we just get some scran and have a couple of quiet ones?”. Anyway, we all broke and said ‘fuck it, just for an hour’, and we all convinced ourselves it’ll break a boring evening up.
Finally ashore, we decided on a few beers first, then scran. (Shit idea). We ended up in a popular place Jb’s/JJ’s or something, can’t remember and got some beers. It was about 1830 and we’re starting to get a taste for it now. A couple of previous nights ago, we were drinking in same place and there was a load of air stewardess’ who worked for Air 2000 (not the RAF one’s) in. There was only a handful in tonight though and they came over to the four of us minding our own business at our table. Tbh, they were sound and a good laugh. Well time starts to disappear by now and it’s getting on for midnight. The ship sails at 0900 and therefore leave expires early at 0700 I think it was. At this stage two of the more sensible lads decide to get back onboard leaving me, my oppo and three girls. The bar was about to shut and the girls suggested we went back with them for a few drinks. We decided it would be a good idea because if we went to sleep now we would be worse in the morning. But, If we drank at a steady pace and got to breakfast then specials, we’d be sound (matelot ideology).
My oppo bottled in a taxi back to the girls place and tried his best to persuade me too (wish I did), but I carried on. Anyway, I remember drinking some random spirits and the next thing I know I’m waking up in the morning. She’s lying beside me, oh dear.
I looked at my watch and it said 0810!!! OH FUCK! I shook her next to me asking what the time was and she said the same. Still thinking all the clocks and watches are wrong I shock her mate next door and she said the same. Then, the absolute feeling of dread overcomes. Shit.
Not sure if I had a phone then or what, but it wasn’t on me. So obviously I had no contact with the ship etc. I just decided to get going and try and get a taxi to dockyard from wherever I am. I got outside and it was fucking redders already, making me feel even worse. It’s about 0830 by now and I’ve found a taxi and I’m on way to the dockyard.
Those of you who know Bahrain dockyard, you’ll know it’s a mission from the gates to the jetties where our ships berth.
Through the gates and I’m on way to the jetty where there’s another barrier with a guy on it. He asks what ship and I reply that one. I pointed at the arse end just visible on its way to sea. ‘You in big trouble’, he tells me. Yeah, ‘cheers dit’s’. It’s around 0930 by now.
Next, a white minibus pulls up and a crab officer jumps out ranting and raving, which I didn’t need.
He had my passport on him and said if they can’t organise a sea boat to get me, I’ll have to either join them at the next stop which is Dubai, or pay for the fuel for helo transfer. Both options were shite and now I feel physically sick thinking it maybe the cheapest option to pay for a flight back to UK and go and see the lovely reggies in HMS Drake. Who, would have a fucking field day with this.
Around 10 minutes later after getting lectured on going ashore I hear the guy on the gate talking on the radio to the ship. They were sending a boat out and it’s gonna be 10 minutes!!! Yes!! Now I feel ‘slightly’ better.
My mate Joe Fraser is driving the boat as it pulls up to jetty and I jump in with my passport, which I snatch off the crab cunt. On way back to ship he advises me to look remorseful and don’t laugh as the the Jimmy is threaders. Ok, fair one.
Apparently they piped from the bridge when we were getting back to get recovered...
‘D’ya hear there. No members of the 39man mess to be on the upper deck while we recover stbd sea boat.’ That pipe was like a red rag to a bull and the lads cleared the mess.
Oh dear, there’s a phot of me in soaking civvies, holding the girls knicks above my head. (I’ll try and dig it out).
Back on board for bollocking after bollocking.
The Jimmy, apparently, had to phone some grown ups in London asking to delay sailing as we were on operational tasking that day and would be late in theatre (not sure if that’s true, but got a good chance).
I also had the forenoon, but CPO (R) gives me a few hours for head down as long as I have a good dit. (Top bloke).

Final result:
14 days No 9’s, followed by 10 days No 10’s, a hefty fine (can’t remember) to cover fuel for boat.
Negative killicks course on return.
And a loooooonnnng beer ban on completion of puns.

I was recommended for AC a few months later by the skipper anyway, but I reckon he just wanted rid.

Long dit actually cut short. But safeguard, twelve clips, green foulies etc.

 

[WreckerL]

mentioning missing the ship reminded me of an incident when the boat left Barry Island after a jolly. Back aft we can listen in to the pipes fwd and as we were leaving the following was heard

"Control, Bridge, Captain speaking, is the XO there"
"Listening sir"
"Is everyone onboard"
"Yes sir, all accounted for"
"Then why is the LSA running down the f*cking jetty"

Silence followed by a very quiet "errr, roger"

Much hilarity in the engine room

 

[Alfacharlie]

mentioning missing the ship reminded me of an incident when the boat left Barry Island after a jolly. Back aft we can listen in to the pipes fwd and as we were leaving the following was heard

"Control, Bridge, Captain speaking, is the XO there"
"Listening sir"
"Is everyone onboard"
"Yes sir, all accounted for"
"Then why is the LSA running down the f*cking jetty"

Silence followed by a very quiet "errr, roger"

Much hilarity in the engine room

My pal was QM on the bridge when the guy on the barrier called through saying I’d just arrived.
The skipper apparently said to the Jimmy, “Get the boat to go and pick up that little shit, now”!

Oh dear....
Funny looking back, however totally shitting it at the time.
Joss said after I got passed from XO to CO table that “Colchester is my next stop!”

He was gobsmacked I didn’t go over the wall for it.
I was too, tbh.

 

[SONAR-BENDER]

I was still a junior on my first ship, a Type 14. Gangway duty as Bosun's Mate, ship sailing at 08 dubs or whatever. I was doing the shakes.... no problems until I got to Lt WEED (written in the Shakes Book in capitals). Off I plods to the Cabin Flat - checks names on all cabin doors.

Strange, no Lt Weed - ah well, at least I tried.

A couple of hours later there was an excretia/fan interface moment, with me in the middle.

The WEO is going apeshit - 'Why didn't I get my shake at dark o'clock - get your hat etc'

I got off with it as a) I was a dim sprog dabber and b) WEED was actually WEEO, which in those days meant Weapons Electrical Engineering Officer aka WEO. He had crap handwriting!

They all wrote their names after that!

 

[mainbrace]

1968, I joined my first ship, the Daring (D05) during its final commish. We were guard ship for a short spell in Gib, so the boilers had to stay flashed up whilst alongside. We were allowed ashore in 'smart' civvies but jeans were not permitted. In my locker, I had a brand new pair of Jet jeans, which rivalled Levis back in the day. I was a dayworking greenie, and thought I would be God's gift to every party on the Rock if I was to trap in my new jeans. Was it worth the risk of going ashore in them? Let's put it to the test.
On a Friday evening I slunk down the gangway in my jeans and legged it. I guess that the OOW must have been in the wardroom because he wasn't on the gangway and no one challenged me. Many wets and several hours later, I was back on board - and no, I hadn't trapped! I turned in and the following morning, at both watches of the hands, the PO Elec was detailing us off for duties when I was piped for - 'report to the Master at Arms in the Chiefs' mess'. Why on earth did the Joss want to see me, I tried to convince myself.
At the Chief's mess, I wasn't invited inside, so I knew this was going to be bad news. The Jossman came to the door and the very short conversation went something like this.
"Did you go ashore last night?"
"Yes Master."
"What were you wearing?"
Long pregnant pause..........................."Er, jeans Master." Clearly, I had been pinged by someone, but he never said by whom, and I never asked. The hole was already deep enough and I knew the game was up.
"You know the fucking rules. Do you want to appear at the Captain's table on Monday morning, or do you accept my punishment?"
"Your punishment Master."
"Right, no fucking make and mend for you this afternoon. Report to the Buffer after dinner, he's got a job for you."
Non-watchkeeping dayworkers could expect make and mends at the weekend whilst alongside, but mine was down the tubes. After dinner, I saw the Buffer. He sent me to the paint store to draw a pot of black paint and various bits of rope. I was then ordered to give the top part of the main mast some tlc and a coat of paint. No problem, except that the skeleton of the main mast enclosed the main funnel - and the boilers were flashed. I spent the next three hours or so, dangling up the mast, roasting in the afternoon sun whilst swathed in the fumes being emitted from the funnel.
Did I go ashore in jeans again? Did I fcuk - lesson learned the hard way!
I never did find out who the Joss' informant was.

 

[Perry]

Probably the buffer who needed someone to paint his mast

 

[SONAR-BENDER]

I've just come across this. When you've just GOT to have a coffee. (And kill 600 of your mates.)

German Soldiers Tried to Make Coffee Using Flamethrower Fuel — and 600 Died

In May 1916, a handful of German soldiers trying to make coffee decided to use the most flammable substance available: flamethrower fuel.

coffeeordie.com

 

[Waspie]

No dits, cock ups, that I will admit to!!!

I deny everything!! Everything!!!!

 

[Alfacharlie]

I have a quick dit:
I’ve just seen @Marlin spike name post a thread, and it reminded me of something.

Scene: HMS DRYAD.
Date: Mid nineties.
Time: After Midnight.

After the usual shite run ashore in dogshit city (route alpha, Joannas, Mucky Duck et al), it was time to ROB after watching my oppos piss in the palm tree on the dance floor. On return we had the usual predicament of the after midnight log.
So, my entry was Marlon Spike. Then, I departed to beddy byes.

Sat in simulators in the morning (again), I had a tap on the shoulder. I’m so clever, I wrote my service number, mess number and what course I was on (including class).

Result: 5 days No 9’s for falsifying an official document and drinking under age.

Quicker than last dit. Trying to keep this thread alive as I think it’s got potential.