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Trevor Edwards | all galleries >> Sheppey Pictures and Postcards >> Sheerness Dockyard > Capsized 1953.
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Capsized 1953.

The Frigate Berkeley Castle, blown over by ferocious winds and water.
Damage at Sheerness dockyard was estimated at £1.5 million and was described as the "worst peace-time catastrophe".


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Guest 23-Oct-2020 10:59
I lived in the dockyard from 1952 to 1957 and remember the great flood.My sisters and I used to ride around the dockyard on our bikes and I remember HMS Berkely Castle laying on its side in the dry dock
My father was in charge of the fire brigade
Guest 25-Mar-2013 19:16
Hi
I served my time as a shipwright in the Dockyard from 49-54. This happened in No2 dock. Before they could refloat her they welded a large diameter tube down the stem and folded the forward plates around it. The dock was then flooded.
Jason Friend
Peter Cook 25-Feb-2013 14:46
Hi - my name is Peter Cook and I write the Memories pages for the Medway Messenger. I have just written a story about a vessel almost coming to grief in the No 4 Dock at Chatham in 1953. Your picture of the Berkeley Castle would illustrate this beautifully and I wondered if you could let me have a jpeg copy. I would of course give appropriate credits. On a personal note my great grandfather served at Sheerness with the RN and my grandfather was born there so I shall search through the site for family history reasons.
Regards - Peter Cook
Guest 01-Jun-2008 11:42
HMS Berkeley Castle (K387) was a Castle-class corvette of the United Kingdom's Royal Navy. She was named after Berkeley Castle in Gloucestershire.

She was laid down at the Barclay, Curle & Co. Ltd. shipyard in Glasgow on 23 March 1943 and launched five months later on 19 August and commissioned on 18 November. She served as a convoy escort until the end of the Second World War.

She was then placed in reserve at Harwich. She suffered serious damage when she capsized in dock at Sheerness during severe flooding in February 1953 but was refloated and repaired. She was in reserve at Sheerness until 1956. She arrived at Grays in Essex on 29 February 1956 for scrapping.
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