Ghana student cadet tour Her Majesty Ship Trent (H.M.S Trent) of the British Royal Navy. A team of twenty (20) led by the Greater Accra Regional Director of Education’s representative, Mr. Ayensu Botsie, the director of Physical Education and Sports, and Cadet Naval Lt. Zaid Kelvin Opkoti Mensah, embarked on a familiarization tour of the ship.
The tour had students selected from Labone Senior High, Our Lady of Mercy Senior High school, and the Tema Technical Institute.
The team arrived at the harbor exactly 14:20hrs on 10th November, 2021, and were received by Staff Sergeant Joel, the Deputy Defense Advisor at the British High Commission in Ghana. The team went through series of educational activities and were shown some defensive and offensive types of weapons and equipment onboard the vessel. The team had the opportunity to know the strengths and duties of the crew onboard the ship.
The HMS prefix originated in the British Royal Navy, where it was used to denote warships as early as the 18th century. HMS is the longest-serving type twenty three (23) frigate in the Royal Navy. Built in the late 1980s at the Yarrow Yard in Scotstoun on the Clyde (today part of BAE Systems), she was commissioned in 1991.
The students for the first time in their lives could not believe touring a warship especially during this period of COVID 19; an activity that the youth have missed from the Armed Forces since 2019. In a brief comment by one of the students, she desired that a number of students from across the country could have the opportunity to see what they are seeing during the visit and wished this would be a continuing educational tour.
The tour which lasted a couple of hours ended with a song;
“We shall overcome,
We shall overcome,
We shall overcome, some day.
Oh, deep in my heart,
I do believe
We shall overcome, some day.”,
as they sat comfortably in the National Cadet Corps’ new bus to their respective schools.
They wished COVID 19 never existed to enable them socialize among themselves on cadet basis.
H.M.S Trent’s familiarization tour by the cadets, on the 10th of November, 2021 at 14:00hrs will never be forgotten in the minds of these young cadets.
By
Staff Officer Rosemary Dorlegbenu
