What is the minimum crew needed to operate a Tribal-class destroyer?
Short answerA four-person Haida crossing is proposed as a joke, with little sleep expected. Another participant suggests roughly ten as an absolute minimum, but no settled manning requirement is established.
NotesThe Ship Shape crew's proposal to take Haida across the Atlantic begins with the condition that her propellers could be reattached to their shafts. The four-person allocation puts one person in the engine room, one in a boiler room, one at the steering position, and one working out the course. Haida's wheelhouse is separate from the exposed bridge, so the person steering cannot see where the ship is going. Only one of the two boiler rooms would be active. Another participant suggests roughly ten people as a bare minimum, while the four-person proposal answers the watchkeeping problem with a joke about getting very little sleep.