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21 July 2017
On Friday 19 June, The Royal School was delighted to welcome Commander Ben Wales RN to give a Royal Lecture at the Senior School.
Commander Wales is Commander Logistics on HMS Prince of Wales, a new Aircraft Carrier, after which The Royal School’s boys’ boarding house is named. He joined the Royal Navy in September 1993 after graduating from the London School of Economics. After gaining the Chartered Institute’s World Examination Prize for Economics in 1999 and completing training in 2000 Ben Wales was appointed to Commodore Naval Aviation HQ. He has been Captain’s Secretary on HMS Illustrious and HMS Ark Royal, Logistics Officer on HMS Glasgow, and Logistics Advisor to the Iraqi Navy in Umm Quasr during the UK withdrawal from Basra and SE Iraq under Op Brockdale. He joined the first Ship’s Company of HMS Prince of Wales in build as Commander Logistics in December 2016.
Commander Wales gave a fascinating lecture to senior pupils, covering the strategic vision and environment which led to a ship of this size and capability being built. He also talked about the challenges of building an Aircraft Carrier and described the scale, operations, accommodation and other facilities of HMS Prince of Wales.
Mrs Anne Lynch, Principal, said, “Commander Wales’ presentation provided a powerful insight into the amazing opportunities and extraordinary challenges faced by the command team of a vessel of this size. HMS Prince of Wales is due to make its first entry into Portsmouth in 2019, the year in which our Senior boys and girls will enter the Upper Sixth together. Many thanks to Commander Wales for an inspiring lecture.”
