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I believe the following paragraph in the section on Construction is unnecessarily aggressive: "Britannia it was claimed (as justification for the cost) was designed to be converted into a hospital ship in time of war, however when the need came in the Falklands War this capability was exposed as being spurious as HMY Britannia, unique among the Royal Navy's fleet, required special fuel oil (unique to her) and had only a 200-bed capacity. Instead, the 16,907-gross-register-ton (47,880 m3) P&O liner SS Uganda, which was in the Mediterranean on an educational cruise with a thousand schoolchildren on board, was requisitioned, and modified to become a hospital ship." The fact that by 1982 most RN ships were running on different fuel was a result of HMYs age, not a sign the justification was "spurious". Also, the 200-bed capacity wasn't a problem, and was greater than the replacement ship125.236.232.27 (talk)06:15, 18 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
My recollection is that Britannia needed Furnace Fuel Oil (FFO) to power it, a fuel that the RN was withdrawing from use. Having said that I recall that Hermes, one of the Aircraft Carriers was also fueled with FFO, and needed a dedicated tanker carrying FFO, for its sole use. This prevented Britannia from participating in the conflict. Another issue was the number of times she would have had to refuel, usually done by RAS (Refueling at sea). Also, as correctly stated, she only had a 200 bed capacity; a change over that would have disrupted the internal layout of the ship itself. Besides Uganda being used as a Hospital Ship, also Hecla, Herald and Hydra, all RN survey ships, were converted into ambulance ships to ferry the wounded to Uganda. Most of the other RN ships in the task forces were fueled with Diesel or Kerosene, IIRC. In her final years of operation up to 1997, I was advised Britannia was converted to Diesel.Aquizard (talk)11:26, 2 September 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I have removed the statement that the ship's "positioning in Leith coincided with ... the advent of Scottish devolution", because it implies that her arrival in Leith was somehow the result of - or otherwise connected with - devolution. It's true that she arrived in the same year as the opening of the Scottish parliament, but that does not mean there was a connection between the two events. If any editor disagrees, feel free to reinstate, but if you do, please supply a citation.Mike Marchmont (talk)08:49, 12 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
