The Story of HMAS NIRIMBA – Apprentices from 1956 to 1966.

Overview:

The RAN began training its own trades apprentices in July 1956 at HMAS NIRIMBA. The decision to train its own apprentices was due to a severe shortage of transfers of skilled artificers from the Royal Navy and dwindling enlistments of qualified Australian tradesmen. These tradesmen shortages were largely due to a severe global skills shortage in the post WW2 recovery and boom period, very much like Australia is experiencing in 2025. The RAN’s apprenticeship scheme was highly sought after and in its first decade produced highly skilled tradesmen for the RAN’s expanding modernised fleet of mainly steam powered ships and its new Fleet Arm.

This presentation by Bill Marcroft, a former NIRIMBA apprentice and later Marine Engineer Officer, looks at NIRIMBA “the place” and the diverse range of activities that made the Royal Australian Navy Apprentice Training Establishment (RANATE) such a success during its first decade of operation. Many previously unseen photos will provide a graphic understanding of what life was like for the young sixteen- to twenty-year-old apprentices during their four years of intensive training before joining The Fleet.

The PowerPoint style trip down memory lane of “NIRIMBA the place” is based mainly on photos from Bill’s own collection along with others generously provided by the large cohort of ex NIRIMBA apprentices, mainly from the period covering 1956 to 1966.

Presenter – Bill Marcroft

1956. L. “Bill” Marcroft was born at Broken NSW and moved to Manly NSW when he was eight. At sixteen he joined the Royal Australian Navy in July 1963 and along with eighty-three other apprentices, this being the fifteenth intake to NIRIMBA since the start of the RAN’s apprenticeship scheme in July 1956. Following six months basic training, he was selected to be an Engineroom Artificer Apprentice (ERAA). With his originally scheduled training time at NIRIMBA reduced from the normal four years to three and a half years he commenced his sea-time on HMAS VAMPIRE in January 1967, still as an apprentice, a posting that lasted four years, before leaving as a fully qualified ERA2 with an Engine Room Ticket.

Subsequent postings were to HMA Ships STALWART, PENGUIN, ANZAC (2), CERBERUS (for CMPT4 Q Course), MELBOURNE, KUTTABUL (for Naval Support Command), MELBOURNE, BRISBANE.

Commissioned in 1980 and off to the UK for the Marine Engineer Special Duties Officer Course (MESDOC) with training at RNC GREENWICH and RNEC Manadon along with gas turbines training. Back in Australia in 1981, two years at FHQ, then to HMAS TORRENS as the Deputy MEO for two years. Bill’s final posting was HMAS KUTTABUL for Naval Support Command, serving at the Navy Supply Centre, Zetland as the FREEMANTLE Class Rotatable Pool Manager.

After resigning in 1985, Bill worked for the startup high technology filtration company Memtec Ltd, initially as the Production Manager and later as the Quality Assurance Manager closely involved with several Defence related contracts for Navy, Army and Air Force, which also included participation in Defence’s 1990 Industrial Mobilisation Course. From 1992 to 2001 Bill was the Quality Assurance Manager at Howden Australia, supplying large high technology fans for coal-fired power stations, mines, steelworks and other major engineering projects. From 2002 to 2011 with Moody International Bill coordinated and managed the provision of inspection and expediting services both locally and globally for numerous major oil and gas, mining and renewables projects taking place around Australia.

Detail –

Date and Time: – 1100, Wednesday 18^th. June 2025 (Sydney time)

Please Join Us