Naval officers promoted

Press, 24 December 1986, Page 4

Naval officers promoted

Four senior officers of the Royal New Zealand Navy will be promoted early next year. .

Captain lan Hunter, the Naval Force Development Study Director, will be promoted commodore and will become Assistant Chief of Defence Staff, Development Plans, at Defence Headquarters.

Captain Hunter, who was educated at Christchurch Boys’ High School, joined the Navy in 1957. In 1974, he was appointed executive officer of H.M.N.Z.S. Canterbury and in 1979 took command of H.M.N.Z.S. Waikato.

He was promoted captain in April, 1982, and became the first commanding officer of H.M.N.Z.S. Southland when the ship was bought from the Royal Navy in June, 1983.

Captain Hunter will be succeeded by Captain Tony Lewis, of Wanganui, who is deputy head of the New Zealand Defence Liaison Staff in London.

Commander .Karl Moen, of Christchurch, will also receive promotion in January when he becomes captain. He will be promoted in his present post of Director of Naval

Operations and Plans in the Naval Staff, Wellington.

Commander Moen is a communications special-

ist. He joined the Navy in 1958, graduating from the Australian Naval College H.M.A.S. Cresswell with first-class honours.

After serving in the New Zealand frigates Waikato, Canterbury, and Taranaki he was appointed personal staff officer to the Chief of Navaf Staff. He was promoted commander in 1978 and appointed Deputy Director of . Defence Intelligence before becoming commanding officer of H.M.N.Z.S. Otago in 1980. After an appointment as Fleet Operations Officer in Auckland, he returned to Wellington to take up his post in Naval Staff.

Other appointments are:

Commander John Leonard, of Blenheim, commanding officer of H.M.N.Z.S. Southland, will be granted the acting rank of captain.

Commander Kevin Wilson will become Director of Resources Programmes at Defence Headquarters and will be granted the temporary rank of captain.

Commander Mike Lloyd, of Auckland, has been appointed first commanding officer of the Navy’s new tanker, now being built in Korea. He is commanding officer of H.M.N.Z.S. Waikato, but will take command of H.M.N.Z.S. Endeavour when the. latter ship is commissioned in November, 1987.