News

In February 2012 North west area officer LT Colonel Davies RM popped into the unit to experience a 'normal' parade night in Huyton sea cadets. he was welcomed by staff and cadets and at the end of the evening presented us with our 2011 Burgee and Stephensons trophy identifying us as the top unit in the North west area sea cadets.

We at Huyton with Roby sea cadets decided that January was the ideal time to beat the post christmas blues, a group of young cadets were booked to attend HMS Raleigh on a Continuation of unit training course.
Our staff booked us and we headed off, for many of us it was our first sea cadet adventure...
We met up at liverpool lime street we we departed by train, some of us had never travelled so far especially not by train... three trains later and feeling very tired we arrived in Plymouth where we were met by Vigilant squadran staff and escorted to HMS Raleigh... by the time we arrived time was late, we were allocated our bunk spaces and advised of the rules!!  We went to bed full of anticpation about what the rest of our week might include.  Call the hands on monday was bright and early, we washed and quickly dressed into our 4's before marching to breakfast. While in the dining hall we catch a glimpse of one of our old Petty Officers, (she is in phase 1 training currently). We wave as she leaves the dining hall.  The first moring we attend a briefing from the CO of Vigilant, Following this we are marched to the drill shed "To prepare us for life onboard a naval base", on return its a quick change into our overalls... our first challenge is some team work as we are timed around the obstacle course. There were a few highs and lows, some of us found it difficult to trust our fellow cadets lifting us over the wall, others found it difficult walking across the high walls... despite this we all managed to complete even the wire walk and ropes at the end.  Looking at a watch we realise it's only lunchtime!! We change back into uniform and head off to be fed. After lunch we were lucky to have a tour around HMS Couragous (a Submarine museum), it's amazing how people live in such confined spaces!  After tea that evening the staff keep us busy at the swimming pool, where some of us completed our swim tests. 
Tuesday is just as busy; we follow the usual morning routine, we depart early for harbour training, we get to drive a boat around the harbour, witnessed RFA ships stocking up ready for deployment and learn a bit about navigation.   In the afternoon we had a fun afternoon planned at Plymouth Pavillions where our instructors took us ice skating, we had great fun skating and trying to make the staff fall over!!
By wednesday we are fully into the Raleigh routine, then head for sea survival training, this is in the swimming pool and is good fun, when we return we attend a phase one brief, we were informed afterwards that the master of arms was impressed by the questions we asked about career development options and how the current economic climate is affecting the forces.  We spend the afternoon at Mount Edgecombe park walking and sightseeing. While there we see that HMS Iron Duke our affiliated ship has come in briefly for a break from sea trials we think!!  Thursday was by far our favourite day, we marched to fire school in the morning and learned about fighting fires, the instructors down there were brilliant, the lit real fires for us to put out with hoses and extinguishes, it was great to put into practice the theories we are taught by our unit staff back in Huyton. After a short stand easy, we head to the damage control unit, here we are taught about repairing damaged ships while at sea... no sooner are we told what to do than we get put into a simulator ship that rapidly fills with water while we had to try repairing the holes with wooden wedges and techniques we had been taught.  We were all soaked and loved every minute. While up here the CO of Vigilant pays us a visit and asks us if in the afternoon we could do a presentation for him about our unit and what we like about cadets, we agree to this, we also surpries the staff at Vigilant when we ask about the possibility of also completing the Raleigh assault course.  The staff were surprised they thought we would be too tired... while we have developed our team work, decison making and communication skills and gained insight into the Navy way of life, from us the sea cadet staff based at Raleigh learned that us cadets from huyton thrive on challenges, we are up for anything and we are difficult to tire, we completed every challenge they threw at us.  The week was busy, action packed and fun but all the while we were observing the discipline and routine of Raleigh life. Each of us did things we had never done before, there was lots of laughter and a few tears BUT Would we do it all again?? Absolutely we can't wait to get back down there and see what the next challenge is!!!  

Following the success of the girls football team, the junior boys also managedto play off the competition and are now partaking in a busy training schedule to prepare to take on the best of the other north west area junior football teams at the area competiton in 2012.

The units president Commander Harley RN Rtd. popped along to both the training sessions and the competition to offer all the teams words of advice and encouragement.

The senior boys team came a respectable 3rd.  Well done to all units who had teams playing...

The junior girls football team managed to retain their trophy at this years district football competition.

This means for the 2nd year in a row they are off to the North west area competion to compete against teams from around the North west.

this year we have seen an outstanding success rate for completion of the varying levels of DofE awards.

For the first time in 12 years 5 of our ships company have completed their gold award.

It wasnt just the cadets being awarded, a few staff members received their awards too, as well as Sergeant Roscoe who received an award in recogntion of the 10 years service he has given to running the DofE programme.