Skip to content

Diving Tenders – Manawanui iv

Ex-Royal Navy commander praised for saving lives after New Zealand naval ship sinks

  • by

7th October 2024 at 12:33pm

HMNZS Manawanui had been under the command of ex-Royal Navy officer Commander Yvonne Gray (Picture: New Zealand Navy Today)

A former Royal Navy officer who now serves in the Royal New Zealand Navy has been praised for her decision to evacuate everyone aboard the stricken HMNZS Manawanui. 

Commander Yvonne Gray gave the order for all hands to abandon ship when it ran aground and caught fire off the coast of Samoa – it then listed heavily and 12 hours later was entirely submerged

Chief of Navy, Rear Admiral Garin Golding, said she made the “right decision” to evacuate the 75 people aboard, which “saved lives”.

He added: “Evacuating a ship at night is an incredibly complex and dangerous task.”

Defence Minister Judith Collins says a Court of Inquiry will establish how the Navy ship crashed into a reef.

She called the evacuation “something of a triumph, frankly”, given the difficult conditions.

HMNZS Manawanui crew saved Samoa 051024 CREDIT Samoa Fire and Emergency Services Authority FACEBOOK
The decision of Cdr Gray to abandon ship has been praised as all 75 crew and passengers were rescued (Picture: Samoa Fire and Emergency Services Authority)

Originally from Harrogate in Yorkshire, Cdr Gray took the helm of the RNZN’s dive, hydrographic and salvage vessel HMNZS Manawanui in December 2022.

Her career began in the Royal Navy when she joined in 1993, after spending university holidays at a Sea Cadet facility in the Lake District.

She spent most of her junior career at sea, including on the aircraft carrier HMS Invincible and the minehunters Walney, Bridport and Cromer, after specialising as a Mine Warfare Officer.

After completing the Principal Warfare Officer course in 2004, she joined HMS Westminster as the PWO (Underwater) and Operations Officer, with operational experience in West Africa, Northern Europe and the Gulf.

HMNZS Manawanui CREDIT NEW ZEALAND NAVY
Cdr Gray said taking command of HMNZS Manawanui in December 2022 ‘was that opportunity that made my eyes light up’ (Picture: Royal New Zealand Navy)

Following a posting to the Maritime Warfare Centre in Portsmouth, she took the opportunity in 2009 to work with the Royal Australian Navy at HMAS Watson, Sydney.

Cdr Gray then moved to New Zealand in 2012 after a campervan holiday where she and her wife fell in love with the country.

Speaking to New Zealand’s Navy Today magazine in 2022, she said: “How do we get to live here, we asked ourselves,” adding: “The most obvious thing was to apply to join the Royal New Zealand Navy.”

On taking command of HMNZS Manawanui, Cdr Gray said: “It was that opportunity that made my eyes light up.”

HMNZS Manawanui returns from South Pacific deployment

Working alongside Royal Australian Navy forces, disposing of Second World War bombs in Vanuatu, marching in a street parade in Tonga and surveying areas of the sea floor in Ha’apai has kept the Royal New Zealand Navy Littoral Warfare Force busy.

10 July, 2024

HMNZS Manawanui arrived back at Devonport Naval Base on Wednesday, allowing the crew to take a well-earned break after the busy deployment.

Commander Yvonne Gray has now led HMNZS Manawanui through two Operation Calypso deployments to the South West Pacific, and says the highlight of this one was completing the disposal of five 1000lb bombs located in around 20 metres of water in Port Vila harbour.

Five Maritime Explosive Ordnance Disposal (MEOD) divers from the expeditionary unit HMNZS Matataua used low order charges to crack the bombs open, filling them with sea water and rendering them safe with minimal disturbance to sea life and the reef.

“From the planning at Headquarters Joint Forces in New Zealand and at HMNZS Matataua, through to the liaison and cordon support from the Vanuatu Mobile Force, Vanuatu Police, and the Vanuatu Ports and Harbour Authority, this was an effective and efficient operation that really demonstrated the team effort between the New Zealand Defence Force and Vanuatu officials,” said Commander Gray.

Able Rating Nicole Anderson was the lead hydrographer embarked on the ship, working with HMNZS Matataua’s Survey Search and Rescue (SSR) team to complete a survey of a 41 nautical miles squared area in Ha’apai, Tonga, in just 72 hours.

“We’d been asked by the Government of Tonga to carry out the hydrographic survey, which will improve safety of navigation after the eruption of the Hunga Tonga-Hunga Ha’apai volcano and subsequent tsunami in January 2022.  We were joined by two hydrographers from the Republic of Fiji Navy and one from the Tongan Royal Navy, which gave them some valuable experience and meant they were part of an important task which will benefit all Pacific nations and mariners when navigating in and around Tonga.”

The SSR and MEOD teams were just two of the deployable teams who joined HMNZS Manawanui for the operation.

Diving Tender – Manawanui – iv

HMNZS Manawanui is a multi-role offshore support vessel currently commissioned in the Royal New Zealand Navy. The ship replaces two decommissioned vessels, the hydrographic survey ship HMNZS Resolution and the diving support vessel HMNZS Manawanui.[4]

Defence officials reviewed 150 vessels before identifying the 85-metre Norwegian built MV Edda Fonn as suitable for conversion. It was delivered in May 2019 and commissioned on 7 June of the same year. Edda Fonn is equipped with the diving and hydrographic systems required by the Navy.

HMNZS Canterbury and HMNZS Manawanui. Manawanui arriving in Auckland
HMNZS Manawanui is a multi-role offshore support vessel currently commissioned in the Royal New Zealand Navy. The ship replaces two decommissioned vessels, the hydrographic survey ship HMNZS Resolution and the diving support vessel HMNZS Manawanui