RN completes 10,000-mile vaccine dash to remote Atlantic island
The Royal Navy has delivered vaccines to one of the most remote communities in the world after a race against time in the South Atlantic.
HMS Forth has landed doses of the Oxford-AstraZeneca Covid vaccine on Tristan da Cunha after a 2,500-mile journey from the Falklands to beat winter storms.
With no airport and no ships able to offload on the island during the austral winter, the 200-plus inhabitants of the British Overseas Territory are cut off from the world for months on end.
Forth, crewed by Portsmouth-based sailors and the Royal Navy’s permanent presence in the Falklands, acted as the last ‘baton carrier’ in a 10,000-mile race to get the vaccine to islanders, after the doses were delivered by the RAF from the UK to the Falkland Islands.
The mission, on behalf of the Foreign and Commonwealth Development Office, proved to be a challenge for Forth with the 5,000-mile round trip close to the limit of the patrol ship’s fuel endurance.
