I did one drill at Mountbatten during the second week of January 1982. It was the start of my Shack AEW Course. The crew that included the new Sqn Boss flew from Inverness to Heathrow and then should have flown to Plymouth. However, the weather was so bad that flights into Plymouth were cancelled. We were then put on the night train down to blizzard hit Devon. Got off the train and straight into the classroom. That night Plymouth got completely cut off due to the severe snowstorms. We were all convinced that there was no way we would do the practical. We maintained that optimism all the way to the launch which we then loaded and set sail. It was so cold on the launch that one of the crew (pilot) went down with hypothermia. We reached the drop off point and those of us that had opted for single seat dinghy did the drag behind boat thing and then into dinghy. And what a surprise as it was much warmer in the water and then the dinghy than on the launch. Those that chose multi seat did not fair so well. Firstly, the new Sqn Boss elected himself to right the dinghy and promptly got stuck underneath. And then half succumbed to the mal de mare. They also spent longer in the dinghy than those of us in the singles. We all deserved the certificates after that.