Our People in TAS
POMT Andy Fairfield - Marine Technician
The former Guided Missile Frigate will be stripped of her warship super structure and sunk off the coast of Terrigal as a dive wreck.
But one member of her decommissioning crew, Petty Officer Marine Technician Andy Fairfield, has no interest in ADELAIDE’s future role as a tourist attraction.
For PO Fairfield, the demise of ADELAIDE marks the end of a seven year history as a senior stoker within the machinery and control rooms of the Navy’s oldest frigate.
Andy, 38, was already a skilled boilermaker welder when he joined RAN in 1997. His job in the engineering department means long hours below deck and maintaining antiquated marine technology and machinery developed during the 1960s.
The engineering department of any big ship is a close knit ‘family’ but in Andy’s case, the faces of the technicians in his team are particularly familiar. Many are from his class at Cerberus where he was an instructor for 12 months in 2003.
Andy’s heart and family remain in Hobart where Andy married his childhood sweetheart Heather shortly after joining the RAN. He is frank about the downside of being away from home for extended years. The couple’s eldest daughter Sophie, now five, was born while he was away serving on ADELAIDE in the Gulf during Operation Slipper.
With the arrival of his second daughter Emilie just over a year ago, Andy hopes his next posting is to ADELAIDE’s sister ship HMAS NEWCASTLE.
The bonus is that NEWCASTLE ‘s homeport of Sydney means a shorter commuter flight home his family in Hobart –as Andy says, if he can’t be with his girls, he wants to go to sea on an FFG.