Q&A · 5:14:56-5:16:04

Wartime boarding and continuing peacetime enforcement

A question about the last boarding action leads to a distinction between a brief wartime recollection and continuing fisheries and drug-enforcement boardings.

Question

When did the Royal Navy last conduct a boarding action?

Short answer

The brief wartime answer offered is World War Two, without a named operation. Peacetime boardings are described as frequent, including fisheries protection and drug seizures.

Notes

World War Two is offered as the wartime answer, without an operation or explanation to establish the chronology. For peacetime, the immediate reply is that a boarding probably happened the previous week. A follow-up mentions a drug seizure and describes fisheries-protection boardings as occurring almost every other day. The substantive distinction is between wartime boarding and the continuing enforcement duties that require sailors to board vessels in peacetime.