HMS Achilles - Frigate F12

On the morning of 12 November 1975, the oil tanker Olympic Alliance and the Royal Navy Frigate HMS Achilles collided in Dover Strait, while sailing in thick fog. This resulted in two holes on starboard, tank N°5, of the tanker. The first one was situated just below the deck line and the other around one meter below water line. The Olympic Alliance lost about 2,000 tonnes of oil just after the collision. Despite this, both vessels later continued their way towards their respective destinations; the HMS Achilles to Portsmouth and the Olympic Alliance to Wilhemshaven in Germany. The latter however lost an additional 10,000 tonnes of oil on her way. She arrived in Germany on 15 November and anchored off Wilhemshaven. On 18 November it was decided to pump oil from tank N°5 and to transfer it to other tanks in the ship. This done the Olympic Alliance was allowed to sail into the harbour for unloading.

These pictures show the damage but its hard to really understand how much damage has been done.  The bow has been crushed and then bent back leaving us with a flat bow, the pressure from the sea when we moved forward meant we could not go above about 2 -3 knots.