The Dutch Frigate “Witte De With” charges at LCDR Glen Miles at 1100 yards and 30kts.

LCDR Miles (Bottom left) and LCDR Mark Hammond (Middle) with teacher and classmates in the torpedo room of Bruinvis Photos courtesy LCDR Glen Miles

The RAN will have two new submarine captains with the latest graduates of Perisher.

LCDR Glen Miles and LCDR Mark Hammond have recently succeeded in the toughest challenge in a submariner’s career, by passing the near-legendary Submarine Command Course, or Perisher.

Passing Perisher is the culmination of many years spent at sea in submarines by both officers.

The course, which is conducted in Holland with extensive sea periods off Norway and in the extremely shallow and confined waters of The Minches and the Clyde Estuary in Northern Scotland, ran for a period of four months and subjected the pair to pressures that would only normally be expected in war-like scenarios.

Their tactical ability, sense of judgement and physical endurance were all pushed constantly by their teacher, CMDR Marc Elsensohn RNLN, so that each student became aware of their own limitations as well as their own abilities.

As well as LCDR Miles and LCDR Hammond, the course was also successfully completed by a Dutch officer, and for the first (successful) time an officer from the USN, LCDR Todd Cloutier, who spent several weeks at HMAS Stirling prior to the course, conducting preparation and familiarisation with his Australian colleagues.

LCDR Cloutier, who was used to deep SSN operations, was later in the course heard to say, “I am never going to periscope depth again” after a close encounter with two warships and a Nimrod MPA.

During their sea time off Norway, the Perishers spent 16 hours a day with three Dutch and Danish frigates charging the submarine’s periscope at maximum speed, all the while remaining at periscope depth and keeping the crew safe by quick and accurate periscope observations combined with precise mathematics.

As the three warships bore down on their elusive quarry, the Perishers waited until the last second on their watches before issuing the order to take the submarine deep.

The quiet Arctic waters ensured that the crew were well aware of the close proximity of their hunters by the loud “swish-swish-swish” of high speed propellors as the frigates repeatedly passed less than 10 metres overhead.

The second sea phase consisted of four intense weeks in the waters of Northern Scotland on the Dutch submarine HNLMS Bruinvis.

It included ten inshore operations for each of the students, two weeks inside The Minches as part of the JMC Exercise with seven other submarines and more than 30 warships.

There were also several submarine versus submarine exercises with the Royal Navy’s most lethal hunter-killer HMS Torbay.

The inshore operations included simulated mine lays, sensor drops, Special Forces launch and recovery and periscope reconnaissance.

The operations were opposed by ASW forces which were comprised of Type 23 and Type 42 frigates, Merlin helicopters with dipping sonars and sonobuoys, and P3C and Nimrod Maritime Patrol Aircraft.

At the end of the course, after a “Congratulations, Captain” from their teacher, LCDR’s Miles and Hammond, along with the other officers on the Dutch Perisher, joined the successful officers of the British Perisher for the traditional “Perisher Breakfast” at the RN submarine base at Faslane, Scotland.

On Anzac Day, both Australian officers took the opportunity to visit Ypres in Belgium, one of the most significant Australian battle sites of the First World War, and joined hundreds of other Australians (including LSAWASM Jason Lehmann - it’s a small world...) to observe the moving ceremony of the Last Post being played beneath the Menin Gate.

They also visited the Normandy beaches and war graves in France on VE Day, as well as travelling down the autobahns of Germany for the traditional pilgrimage to the U-boat memorial in Kiel, where the names of 35000 submariners from all wars are recorded as “still on patrol”.

LCDR Miles will take up a posting as head of submarine warfare training at Stirling, while LCDR Hammond has been posted to Navy Headquarters prior to attending Australian Command and Staff Course.

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