Astutely Embarrassing

Quite rightly, there's a hell of a row going on about HMS Astute, the new, £1.2 billion, high-tech submarine which the Diary photographed belting down the Sound back in July, and which found itself stuck on a sandbank off Skye yesterday. But the Diary has a nasty feeling that most of the noise is going to miss the point.

Astute hasn't done anything new or particularly surprising. Ships have accidents, whether because there's a technical fault, incompetent or drunk crew, an unexpected current, an unusually severe storm, or because someone makes a genuine mistake. New ships - look at the Titanic - often have problems. The row ought to be about how well-prepared we were, but very soon won't be.

The Diary is writing, of course, about the ship which was quickly on the scene of the incident and which featured in all the news footage, HM Coastguard tug Anglian Prince, which is based at Stornoway ready for just such an emergency. The Government plans to discontinue this service - there are four Coastguard tugs permanently on duty round Britain's coastline.

A sharp-eyed Kilchoan resident, Sue Cameron, saw the Navy's response sailing up the Sound towards Skye yesterday evening, in the form of the sd Solmore and sd Solmaid, Fleet Auxiliaries on their way from the Clyde - by which time the Prince had towed Astute off the sand.

Removing the Coastguard tugs is a foolish, short-sighted decision, and Astute's embarrassment gives the Government a chance to rethink. And we, here on the West Highlands, supported by our local MPs, ought to be sitting up and taking notice - because Astute's problem might have occurred on that filthy evening back in July, when the submarine wasn't off Skye but in the Sound of Mull, and when a technical failure might have seen her beached on Ardnamurchan's south shore.