Navy Expects To Get Helicopters

Press, Volume CIII, Issue 30576, 20 October 1964, Page 18

Navy Expects To Get Helicopters

Although the Government had not given the Royal New Zealand Navy the green light to buy helicopters, the Chief of the Naval Staff (RearAdmiral R. E. Washbourn) said in Christchurch last evening that he felt sure the Navy would get them ultimately. Addressing officers and men of the Canterbury division of the Royal New Zealand Volunteer Reserve, Admiral Washbourn said that one of the two frigates which would replace H.M.N.Z.S. Royalist would have a helicopter hangar and operating deck. Admiral Washbourn said the Royalist could be kept going for two more years after which she would be scrapped to be replaced by two modern frigates. One will be the Waikato. The other the Navy will try to borrow from the Royal Navy. Speaking of the diverse undertakings of the Navy today, Admiral Washbourn said 60 per cent of the 3000 men in it served at sea, and this was a percentatge as high as that of any other Navy he could think of. On all future occasions the New Zealand Navy would send its ships to Pearl Harbour to work up with the United States Navy, he said.

Admiral Washbourn said it was a good thing to be on close terms with the United States Navy—“although we are not trying to get away from the Royal Navy by doing this.” The more the three Navies knew of and understood each other the better it would be.

The Government was well aware of the need for new ships for the New Zealand Navy, said Admiral Washbourn. “I have no doubt they will come along in good time.” Admiral Washbourn said that from what he saw yesterday on his annual inspection, H.M.N.Z.S. Pegasus and the Canterbury division of the R.N.Z.N.V.R. were 100 per cent better than last year. He hinted that radical changes in the structure and training of the R.N.Z.N.V.R. could be expected soon. These changes, approved in principle by the Navy Board, were the result of certain recommendations made by commanding officers of the various volunteer divisions at recent conferences.

More than 100 officers and men paraded before the Chief of Naval Staff last night During the early afternoon he inspected H.M.N.Z.S. Pegasus accompanied by the commanding officer (Commander R. M. J. O’Connor), the executive officer (Commander R. F. Sanderson), and the staff officer to the division (Lieutenant Commander D. E. Nelson). Later in the afternoon the admiral visited the division’s seaward defence launch at Lyttelton and its boatshed at Cass Bay.