![THE SCRAP IRON FLOTILLA. HMAS VAMPIRE [I] and HMAS VOYAGER [I] in looks-like the floating dock at Malta, December 1939 - Photo RAN Historical. | by Kookaburra2011](http://live.staticflickr.com/5024/5701912149_2a62a3c90e.jpg)
Kookaburra2011
THE SCRAP IRON FLOTILLA. HMAS VAMPIRE [I] and HMAS VOYAGER [I] in looks-like the floating dock at Malta, December 1939 - Photo RAN Historical.
4513. Once again we're working very much in the dark information-wise down here in the RAN Archives in Canberra - a place with very few light switches. The city of Canberra, we mean. Anyway, the Kookaburra has just stood up on a chair and held this image to a thin ray of light filtering down from a sub-basement air vent.
We'd say that this shows HMAS VAMPIRE [I] and HMAS VOYAGER [I] in the floating dock at Malta in December 1939, just after their arrival from the Indian Ocean, where they had participated in the hunt for the GRAF SPEE.
While in the dock at this time the ships companies were billeted nearby and used as guards to protect the dock against air attack. In fact the scuttles suggest some may be still living aboard. The Malta floating dock, a very strategic facility, was in fact sunk soon after Italy's entry to the war in June 1940. The Scrap Iron Flotilla ships painted their camouflage patterns on later in Alexandria.
Well, that's that. Dr Who couldn't have done better. The Kooka is now going to fold this photo into the shape of a Japanese 'good luck' paper crane, and leave it on a filing cabinet for the RAN archivists to find, in the event that they ever come down here.
Photo RAN Historical, Heritage Image Collection NO. 03963.
THE SCRAP IRON FLOTILLA. HMAS VAMPIRE [I] and HMAS VOYAGER [I] in looks-like the floating dock at Malta, December 1939 - Photo RAN Historical.
4513. Once again we're working very much in the dark information-wise down here in the RAN Archives in Canberra - a place with very few light switches. The city of Canberra, we mean. Anyway, the Kookaburra has just stood up on a chair and held this image to a thin ray of light filtering down from a sub-basement air vent.
We'd say that this shows HMAS VAMPIRE [I] and HMAS VOYAGER [I] in the floating dock at Malta in December 1939, just after their arrival from the Indian Ocean, where they had participated in the hunt for the GRAF SPEE.
While in the dock at this time the ships companies were billeted nearby and used as guards to protect the dock against air attack. In fact the scuttles suggest some may be still living aboard. The Malta floating dock, a very strategic facility, was in fact sunk soon after Italy's entry to the war in June 1940. The Scrap Iron Flotilla ships painted their camouflage patterns on later in Alexandria.
Well, that's that. Dr Who couldn't have done better. The Kooka is now going to fold this photo into the shape of a Japanese 'good luck' paper crane, and leave it on a filing cabinet for the RAN archivists to find, in the event that they ever come down here.
Photo RAN Historical, Heritage Image Collection NO. 03963.