IN CHARGE OF THE QUEEN'S FUTURE

Bill Hagerty meets the man at the helm

of the world's most famous ship, and biggest public relations problem

ON SUNDAYS the captain of the world's most famous ship conducts divine service from the stage of the upper-deck theatre. '0 Lord,' he intones, 'show Thy mercy upon us.' On the shore, half the width of the North Atlantic away, executives of the trou- bled Cunard line doubtless whisper 'Amen.' On BBC Radio Two one weekday morning, a presenter chats with a caller about a cruise she will soon be taking: 'Is it P & 0 or Cunard?' he asks. 'P & 0, eh. You'll proba- bly get there then.' The executives wince. The captain is continuing with the service. He raises his eyes towards heaven and says: `0 Lord, save the Queen.'

The bridge patrolled by Captain John Burton-Hall RD RNR (Royal Naval Reserve Decoration and Bar) on RMS Queen Elizabeth 2 is one with a view over troubled waters. Although Cunard's flag- ship has sailed clear of the ignominy in which it floundered after its £30 million refit and subsequent disastrous Christmas cruise of 1994, the seas surrounding its owners are stormy. Earlier this year, a fire aboard one of Cunard's luxury cruise ships, the Sagafiord, put the hapless company back in the wrong sort of dock. Last month, another of its ships, the Royal Viking Sun, ran aground, again resulting in the evacuation of passengers and prompt- ing the Egyptians to impound the vessel and lodge an enormous compensation claim for damage to a reef.

Meanwhile, the Norwegian group, Kvaemer, was busy buying Cunard's ailing parent company, Trafalgar House (1995 losses: £320 million), for £904 million and observing that it has little interest in an operation a great many nautical miles removed from the core business of build- ing and engineering. Despite owning five of the world's ten top-rated ships and com- manding 37 per cent of the luxury cruise market, Samuel Cunard's legacy, with loss- es of £16.4 million last year, looks as if it might be sunk.

Not that any of this clouds the jolly atmosphere in the cabins, bars and restau- rants of the QE2, where Captain Burton- Hall's crew of 1,000 ensures that the ship delivers the finest food and drink, diverse entertainment and impeccable service most regally. But everybody associated with the Queen that has ruled the seas, repelling all hostile boarders, for 27 years, realises that its future is uncertain enough for the wise not to invest in too many advance season tickets.

Captain Burton-Hall, a recruit from cen- tral casting if ever there was one, with his Player's cigarette-packet-beard and a trim figure, patently designed with uniforms in mind, chooses his words carefully, as befits the senior captain of the fleet. But the future of Cunard is, he acknowledges, `muddy'. The QE2 and the line's other ships are getting old. The burgeoning cruise mar- ket is spawning big, brash, more economical vessels. But then, ever since her slightly older namesake dispatched her into the Clyde in 1967 and she subsequently suffered engine failure on her maiden voyage, QE2 has been learning that there is no such thing as a free launch.

`It has been a very bad run for the com- pany,' says Captain Burton-Hall, sur- rounded by polished wood and brass in captain's quarters which look as if they are expecting a photographer from a glossy magazine to drop by any minute. 'But I am confident that there is a niche for this ship somewhere. She may not be used quite in the way she has been in the past, sailing out of Southampton and New York on the north Atlantic run and an annual world cruise from one of those ports. You might see her sailing out of Australia. Taking into account what is happening to us ashore, we are already trying out lots of new ideas. We have had a big rethink about the itinerary and next year the ship will cross the north Atlantic in six days, rather than the present five-and-a-half. We'll run across at 24 knots (around 32 mph) rather than 28 plus (38 mph), which makes more sense economi- cally. And at the end of the transatlantic season we shall do some trans-Canal trips, New York to Los Angeles, and our short cruises, ten and 12 days, out of Southamp- ton will become two weeks, which will give us a chance to get somewhere in the Med.

`The ship is capable of running for another, say, 15 years. It's a hell of a big hull and has fairly new engines and lots of expertise. I suppose if it is sold it is really a matter of finding someone who wants to run it. I would look upon it as a great tragedy if this ship was paid off. There isn't another like her — and I don't think you will ever see anything like her again.'

That seems certain. The QE2 cost £36 million and a recent survey concluded that to build a modern equivalent would require upwards of £800 million. 'Where is there anybody brave enough to invest that sort of money in a single unit?' asks John Burton- Hall.

Born at Poole in Dorset (`during the war, I looked at the sea from the tops of cliffs through barbed wire') in 1936 and Pang- bourne-educated, he went to sea as an apprentice with the Blue Funnel Line when just 16. He was on the way to becoming mas- ter of a cargo ship. But he became attracted by the more gregarious ways of passenger ships and joined Cunard in 1965 as a third officer on the Queen Elizabeth, having already gained a Master's Certificate and been given his first command, of a mine- sweeper during RNR service. At the end of 1966, he was appointed hull surveyor of the in-construction QE2 and spent 18 months in Clydebank before sailing as a second officer on the maiden voyage. The only member of the original officer complement still serving, he was promoted to staff captain in 1978 before becoming a Cunard master, of the Cunard Princess, in 1983, a relief captain of the QE2 and, in 1994, the ship's master and Cunard's senior sailor.

`I have amassed a grand total of 14 years on this ship,' he says. 'We have grown mid- dle-aged together. There are times, some- times during the day and sometimes at night, when I actually realise what an awe- some responsibility I have. Sometimes at night I think, "God, it's big!" But there's the thrill of it all as well. I have been very lucky. If I had stayed with Blue Funnel I would have been made redundant — all the cargo lines have disappeared.'

Captain Burton-Hall has been lucky in other ways, too. He was on leave when the ship sailed from Southampton on the infamous 'cruise from hell' following an incomplete refit which left cables strewn in public areas, defective plumbing and fire doors blocked by carpets, causing the US Coastguard to impound her in New York. He was ashore, too, when a 90-ft wave hit the ship like a giant baseball bat last win- ter. He acknowledges such impeccable timing with a wry smile. ► The chaos and bad publicity resulting from the decision by the then chairman John Olsen to sail before the refit was completed was 'another indignity put upon the ship. I am totally soft-hearted about the QE2 and felt sorry for her. But such is her quality, she always seems to shake her- self and go on. For 27 years, puny human beings have fiddled with her and messed with her, but she has great dignity. She's like one of those indomitable British ladies who went out to India in the last century in corsets and bustles. I left the ship to spend Christmas in England and when I got back 12 days later the work the ship's company had done and was doing to recover the sit- uation was remarkable. We were at a nadir. Things were bad, but one of the strengths of this ship is the people in her. Almost by the minute you could see things getting better and better.

`As for the big wave, that was an extraor- dinary event. To run into a 90-ft lump of water is not something you want to happen to you, but the ship just coped with it. Now, you can put it down to Cunard's designers, you can put it down to Scottish shipbuilders, but she took one hell of a thump and went on. I mean, there were a lot of people on board who knew nothing about it — it was just a bang. People have asked how the ship got into that situation, of course, what with modern met forecasting, but that kind of thing just isn't predictable. The sea is a hos- tile environment — the power of nature makes nuclear bombs look puny.

`And now we have had the Sagafiord and Royal Viking Sun, the publicity for which is very unfortunate, although I don't think we should complain about it — we are attention-seeking all the time, after all. Of course, they always hang any Cunard story on the aftermath of the refit, but the fact is that many of those who came off the Sagafiord on to the QE2 — we had 195 of them — were extraordinarily complimen- tary about the way the Sagafiord crew reacted and looked after them. And the QE2 has just completed a very successful world cruise. The passenger satisfaction level has been the highest we have ever had on a world cruise, segment selling (shorter passages within the world cruise itinerary) was up, particularly in Australia. Passengers keep coming back. And Cunard's record of carrying people around the world for 150 years and not losing any- body except through enemy action and the odd suicide still stands, thank God.'

(Some passengers do indeed throw them- selves into the sea from the QE2's deck, after all that money on the ticket necessary to gain passage. So far there have been `about five' of these luxury suicides.) Singular dedication and what some per- cieve as aloofness towards crew members outside his circle of senior officers have earned the captain the below-decks nick- name of Old Grumpy and he confesses: `My job is essentially a lonely one — peo- ple tend not to talk to me until I speak to them.' But accusations of remoteness are unfair, says an officer who has sailed with him for many years: 'Yes, he has that repu- tation, but he is enormously respected and the passengers like him very much, which is what counts.' Not grumpy, then, and not especially old, although Cunard rules dic- tate that John Burton-Hall will retire at around the time of his 61st birthday in July next year. 'I think retirement is very harsh,' he says. 'I shall miss going to sea — I haven't actually spent a winter in England in years. But there are six young master mariners up there on the bridge counting my birthdays, noting how many gin and tonics I drink and very much wanting to be sitting in my seat. That's fair enough — I was just as impatient. Anyway, I am not going home to cut the grass. There are opportunities in the City of London, which is still the home of shipping, and maritime law has always interested me.'

There will also be more time to play with his toys, a 1956 Triumph TR3 and a 1958 Austin-Healey, at his Surrey home, and more time to see. his three grown-up chil- dren, although it is scarcely conceivable that he can spend more time with his wife, Rosemarie, the actress he met when she was performing with a theatre company on board QE2 in 1980 and who invariably is with him during the eight-and-a-half months he spends at sea each year.

That he incorporated her name into his (`she was a Burton, I am a Hall') when they married is indicative of the loyalty that is at the very core of the captain. 'This ship is addictive,' he says. 'Both Rosemarie and myself feel part of it and it is part of us. QE2 is a thoroughbred with style and grace and she is ageless. She is part of the British heritage.'

0 Lord, save the Queen.