His Majesty's Naval Base, Portsmouth (HMNB Portsmouth) is one of three operating bases in the United Kingdom for the Royal Navy (the others being HMNB Clyde and HMNB Devonport). Portsmouth Naval Base is part of the city of Portsmouth; it is located on the eastern shore of Portsmouth Harbour, north of the Solent and the Isle of Wight. For centuries it was officially known as HM Dockyard, Portsmouth: as a Royal Dockyard, Portsmouth functioned primarily as a state-owned facility for building, repairing and maintaining warships; for a time it was the largest industrial site in the world.

From the 1970s, the term 'Naval Base' began to be used for Portsmouth (and other Royal Dockyards), acknowledging a greater focus on personnel and support elements alongside the traditional industrial emphases. In 1984 Portsmouth's Royal Dockyard function was significantly downsized and downgraded, and was formally renamed the 'Fleet Maintenance and Repair Organisation' (FMRO). The FMRO was privatized in 1998; in 2002, shipbuilding (which had not taken place on site since the late 1960s) resumed in the form of block construction, but this again ceased in 2014.

Today, Portsmouth is the home base for two-thirds of the Royal Navy surface fleet, including the two aircraft carriers,  and . Naval logistics, accommodation and messing are provided on site, with personnel support functions (e.g. medical and dental; education; pastoral and welfare) provided by Defence Equipment and Support. Other functions and departments, e.g. Navy Command Headquarters support staff, are also accommodated within the Naval Base. The base is additionally home to a number of commercial shore activities,  including the ship repair and maintenance facility operated by BAE Systems Maritime.

The base is the oldest in the Royal Navy, and it has been an important part of the Senior Service's history and the defence of the British Isles for centuries. It is home to one of the oldest surviving drydocks in the world. The former Block Mills are of international significance, having been the first factory in the world to employ steam-powered machine tools for mass production. The Royal Naval Museum has been on the site since 1911. In 1985 a partnership between the Ministry of Defence and Portsmouth City Council created the Portsmouth Naval Base Property Trust to manage part of the historic south-west corner of the Naval Base, under a 99-year lease, as an  heritage area, the Portsmouth Historic Dockyard. It allows members of the public to visit important maritime attractions such as Mary Rose, ,  and the National Museum of the Royal Navy.

Functioning base
Portsmouth naval base is home to two-thirds of the Royal Navy's surface ships, and employs up to 17,200 people.

Senior personnel
The Naval Base Commander (NBC) since June 2022 is Commodore John Voyce. The harbour is under the control of the King's Harbour Master (KHM), who is the regulatory authority of the Dockyard Port of Portsmouth, an area of approximately  that encompasses Portsmouth Harbour and the Eastern Solent. KHM Harbour Control is based in the Semaphore Tower building. Shipping movements are handled by a team of admiralty pilots headed by the Chief Admiralty Pilot.

In 1836 the Commander-in-Chief, Portsmouth was given accommodation within the Dockyard (in Admiralty House) and in 1889 he was given  to be his ceremonial flagship. These privileges were inherited by the Commander-in-Chief Naval Home Command (whose post was combined with that of Second Sea Lord in 1994), who continued to fly his flag from HMS Victory until 2012. That year the post of Commander-in-Chief reverted to the First Sea Lord, and with it the use of Victory as flagship. The Second Sea Lord is now based  at the Henry Leach Building on Whale Island, which is also the headquarters of the Fleet Commander.

List of based ships
Some of the following ships (e.g. the patrol vessels) are not based in Portsmouth, but form part of the Portsmouth Flotilla.

First-rate ship of the line

Queen Elizabeth-class aircraft carriers

Type 45 destroyers

 – in refit

 – in refit

Type 23 frigates

  (currently in life extension refit)
 (Currently forward deployed to Bahrain for 3 years from 2022)
 (completed LIFEX refit in 2023)
 (inactive; planned to transfer to HMNB Devonport post-life extension refit but refit suspended as of May 2023)

In changes to base porting arrangements announced in November 2017, HM Ships Westminster, Richmond, Kent and St Albans were move to the HMNB Devonport by 2023; HM Ship  moved in the opposite direction.  and  were also to move to Portsmouth. However, under terms of the 2021 defence white paper Monmouth retired in that year and Montrose decommissioned in 2023. Richmond became a Devonport ship on completion of her refit. St Albans moved to Devonport in July 2019 in preparation for her major refit.

Hunt-class mine countermeasures vessels

 – assigned to 9 Mine Countermeasures Squadron operating from HMS Jufair in Bahrain
 – assigned to 9 Mine Countermeasures Squadron operating from HMS Jufair

River-class patrol vessels

 - Fishery protection vessel
 - Fishery protection vessel
 - Fishery protection vessel
 – forward deployed to the Falklands as guard ship since 2019
 – forward deployed to the Caribbean since 2020
 – forward deployed to the Mediterranean and Africa since 2021
 – forward deployed to the Indo-Pacific region since 2021
 – forward deployed to the Indo-Pacific region since 2021

Cutlass-class patrol vessels

 - Gibraltar Squadron
 - Gibraltar Squadron

Archer-class patrol vessels

 – Southampton Universities Royal Naval Unit
 – Birmingham Universities Royal Naval Unit
 – London Universities Royal Naval Unit
 – Sussex Universities Royal Naval Unit
 – Oxford Universities Royal Naval Unit

Experimental vessel
 (since 2022) – experimental vessel in RN service

Defence Dive School/Fleet Diving Unit Portsmouth
 3× Sea-class 15 m diving support boats

Portsmouth Historic Dockyard

Portsmouth Historic Dockyard is the name given to the portion of the base which is open to the public; it plays host to:
 The raised wreck of the Tudor carrack Mary Rose viewable in a new (2013) Mary Rose Museum building.
 , Nelson's flagship at Trafalgar, which (whilst still being in commission) is also open to the public
 , the first ocean-going Ironclad (built at Blackwall on the River Thames in 1860 and now moored in the dockyard).
 , a World War I monitor (opened to the public in 2015)
 The National Museum of the Royal Navy, Portsmouth, one of the world's leading maritime museums. Exhibits include the Trafalgar Sail (the foretop sail of Victory used at the Battle of Trafalgar, 1805)
 Action Stations, a centre containing interactive exhibits demonstrating various aspects of naval science as well as a number of simulators
 The Dockyard Apprentice exhibition, telling the story of the Dockyard itself and working life within it.
 Portsmouth Harbour Tours
 Boathouse 4 (opened 2015), which tells the 'forgotten story' of the small boats of the Navy and is an active boat building and restoration site.

The Portsmouth Naval Base Property Trust has long sought to extend the area of the Historic Dockyard to cover Dry Docks 4 and 5 and the historic Block Mills building among others. In 2015 an architectural design competition for the project was won by Latz+Partner; however, the Ministry of Defence subsequently indicated that property to the north of the Mary Rose will not be ceded for several years at least, due to the site's proximity to the berth of the new Queen Elizabeth-class aircraft carriers.

History

Along with Woolwich, Deptford, Chatham and Plymouth, Portsmouth has been one of the main Royal Navy Dockyards or Bases throughout its history.

Medieval period
Richard I ordered construction of the first dock on the site in 1194, while his successor John added walls around the area in 1212. The docks were used by various kings when embarking on invasions of France through the 13th and 14th centuries, including the Saintonge War in 1242. Edward II ordered all ports on the south coast to assemble their largest vessels at Portsmouth to carry soldiers and horses to the Duchy of Aquitaine in 1324 to strengthen defences.

Tudors

The first recorded dry dock in the world was built in Portsmouth by Henry VII in 1495. The first warship built here was the Sweepstake of 1497; of more significance were the carracks Mary Rose of 1509 and Peter Pomegranate of 1510—both were rebuilt here in 1536. The wreck of the Mary Rose (which capsized in 1545, but was raised in 1982) is on display in a purpose-built museum. A fourth Tudor warship was the galleass Jennett, built in 1539 and enlarged as a galleon in 1558.

The appointment of one Thomas Jermyn as Keeper of the Dock at Portsmouth is recorded in 1526, with a Clerk of the Stores being appointed from 1542. Contemporary records suggest that the dry dock was enlarged and rebuilt in 1523 in order to accommodate the Henry Grace à Dieu (the largest ship of the fleet at that time); but a hundred years later it is described as being filled with rubble.

Following the establishment of Chatham Dockyard in the mid-1500s, no new naval vessels were built here until 1648, but ships from Portsmouth were a key part of the fleet that drove off the Spanish Armada in 1588. There are no on-site remains of the Tudor dock and yard.

Seventeenth century

Naval shipbuilding at Portsmouth recommenced under the English Commonwealth, the first ship being the eponymous fourth-rate frigate Portsmouth launched in 1650. (Portsmouth had been a parliamentarian town during the civil war.) A resident Commissioner was first appointed in 1649; fifteen years later the Commissioner was provided with a house, and extensive gardens, at the centre of the yard. A new double dry dock (i.e. double the standard length so as to accommodate two ships at once) was built by the Commonwealth government in 1656, on what was then the tip of land at the north-west corner of the yard. It was joined by a single dry dock, just to the south; the yard's one shipbuilding slip (completed in 1651) stood between the two docks. These would all have been built of timber, rather than stone.

By 1660 the dockyard had, in addition to these large-scale facilities for shipbuilding and repairs, a new rope house ( in length) and a variety of small storehouses, workshops and dwellings arranged around the site, which was now enclosed by a wooden palisade. After the Restoration, there was continued investment in the site with the excavation of a new mast pond, begun in 1664, alongside which a mast house was built in 1669. Between 1665 and 1668 Bernard de Gomme fortified the dockyard with an earthen rampart (complete with one bastion and two demi-bastions), as part of his wider fortification of Portsmouth and Gosport.

Dummer's pioneering engineering works
As France began to pose more of a military threat to England, the strategic importance of Portsmouth grew. In 1689, Parliament ordered a new dry dock to be built there, large enough to accommodate the latest first-rate and second-rate ships of the line (which were too big for the existing docks). Work began in 1691; as with all subsequent extensions to the dockyard, the new works were built on reclaimed land (on what had been mud flats, to north of the old double dock) and the civil engineering involved was on an unprecedented scale.

The work was entrusted to Edmund Dummer, naval engineer and surveyor to the Navy Board. His new dry dock (the "Great Stone Dock" as it was called) was built to a pioneering new design, using brick and stone rather than wood and with an increased number of 'altars' or steps (the stepped sides allowed shorter timbers to be used for shoring and made it much easier for shipwrights to reach the underside of vessels needing repair). Extensively rebuilt in 1769, the Great Stone Dock is now known as No.5 dock.

Along with the new dock, Dummer proposed that two wet docks (non-tidal basins) be built: the first ("Lower") Wet Dock was entered directly from the harbour and provided access to the Great Stone Dock; since much expanded, it remains in place (now known as "No. 1 Basin"). The second ("Upper") Wet Dock was entered by way of a channel. To empty the dry dock, Dummer designed a unique system which used water from the Upper Wet Dock to drive a water-wheel on the ebb tide, which in turn powered a set of pumps. (At high tide, an auxiliary set of pumps was used, powered by a horse gin.)

In 1699 Dummer adapted the channel leading to the Upper Wet Dock, enabling it to be closed off at each end by a set of gates, thus forming a second dry dock (called the "North Stone Dock" after it was rebuilt with stone altars in 1737, and known today as No 6 dock). Severed from the harbour, the Upper Wet Dock became a reservoir into which water from various nearby dry docks could be drained; it was vaulted and covered over at the end of the eighteenth century, but still exists today underground. By 1700 a shipbuilding slip had been constructed off the (Lower) Wet Dock, parallel with the dry dock (roughly where No 4 dry dock is today).

Eighteenth century

Between 1704 and 1712 a brick wall was built around the Dockyard, following the line of the town's 17th-century fortifications; together with a contemporary (though altered) gate and lodge, much of the wall still stands, serving its original purpose. A terrace of houses for the senior officers of the yard was built at around this time (Long Row, 1715–19); later in the century it was joined by a further terrace (Short Row, 1787). In 1733 a Royal Naval Academy for officer cadets was established within the Dockyard, the Navy's first shore-based training facility and a forerunner of Britannia Royal Naval College in Dartmouth.

The 'Great Rebuilding'
The second half of the eighteenth century was a key period in the development of Portsmouth (and indeed of the other Royal Dockyards). A substantial planned programme of expansion and modernisation was undertaken from 1761 onwards, driven (as would be future periods of expansion) by increases both in the size of individual ships and in the overall size of the fleet. In the 1760s the Lower Wet Dock (by then known as the Great Basin) was deepened, the Great Stone Dock was rebuilt and a new dry dock (known today as No 4 dock) was built alongside it over a five-year period from 1767. During 1771-76 the former Upper Wet Dock was reconfigured to serve as a reservoir into which water from the dry docks could be drained by way of culverts (enabling ships to be dry docked much more speedily). From 1789 work was begun on replacing the old wooden South Dock with a modern stone dry dock (known today as No 1 dock, it currently accommodates the museum ship HMS M33).

North of the reservoir a channel was dug leading to a new boat basin, beyond which several shipbuilding slips were constructed on reclaimed land at what became known as the North Corner of the dockyard. The rest of the reclaimed land was given over to storage space for timber with saw pits and seasoning sheds alongside, as shown in the dockyard model of 1774. The open ground between the Basin and the officers' terrace was likewise used to store timber.

Several of Portsmouth Dockyard's most notable historic buildings date from this period, with several older wooden structures being replaced in brick on a larger scale. The three great storehouses (Nos 9, 10 & 11) were built between 1764 and 1785 on a wharf, alongside a deep canal (or camber) which allowed transport and merchant vessels to moor and load or unload goods; the camber was rebuilt in Portland stone between 1773 and 1785. On the other side of the camber, on newly reclaimed land, two more sizeable brick storehouses were built to serve as a sail loft and a rigging store; the reclaimed land was later named Watering Island after a fresh water supply was provided for ships mooring alongside.

The Great Ropehouse, a double ropery over  in length, dates from the same period. It is, however, the sixth ropehouse (since 1665) to have stood on the site. Both its immediate predecessors were destroyed by fire (in 1760 and 1770) and the current building was itself gutted by fire in 1776 as the result of an arson attack. It was called a 'double' ropery because the spinning and laying stages took place in the same building (on different floors) rather than on two separate sites. Other buildings associated with ropemaking (including hemp houses, a hatchelling house, tarring house and storehouses) were laid out alongside and parallel to the ropehouse; they largely date from the same period. (Ropemaking was discontinued at Portsmouth in 1868, since when the ropery has functioned as a storehouse).

Later, in 1784, a large new house was built for the Dockyard Commissioner. Unusually for the time it was designed by a civilian architect (Samuel Wyatt, with Thomas Telford as clerk-of-works); most other dockyard buildings were designed in-house. The dockyard chapel, built eighty years earlier, was demolished to make way for the new Commissioner's house and a new chapel (St Ann's Church) was built nearby. At the same time a set of offices for the senior officers of the yard was built (in place of an earlier office block), overlooking the docks and basin; it continues to provide office space to this day.

After the old Commissioner's House had been demolished, four identical quadrangular buildings were built, flanking the timber ground east of the Basin; as well as providing storage space, they accommodated workshops for a variety of trades, including joiners, wheelwrights, wood-carvers, capstan-makers and various other craftsmen. A new smithery was also built nearby, immediately to the north (the latest in a succession of smiths' shops to have been built on the site); dating from 1791, it was mainly occupied with anchor making. Ten years later this process was vividly described: "The immense masses of the anchors, the ponderous hammers, the vast size of the bellows, the roaring of the flaming furnaces, the reverberations of the falling cumbrous hammers, and the fiery pieces of metal flying in all directions, are truly awful, grand and picturesque".

Samuel Bentham and industrial revolution

In 1796 Samuel Bentham was appointed Inspector General of Naval Works by the Admiralty with the brief of modernising the Royal Dockyards. As such, he took on responsibility for overseeing the continued rebuilding at Portsmouth and initiated further key engineering works. A prolific inventor and precision engineer, Bentham's initiatives at Portsmouth ranged from instituting new management principles in the manufacturing departments to developing the first successful steam-powered bucket dredger, which began work in the harbour in 1802. His other projects included the following:

The 1761 rebuilding plan had envisaged the old wooden double dock being refurbished, but Bentham instead proposed expanding the Basin (building over the double dock in the process) and adding a further pair of single docks built entirely of stone (unlike previous 'stone docks' which had had timber floors). The proposal was accepted; the new docks (now known as Nos 2 and 3 docks) were completed in 1802-3 and are still in place today (accommodating HMS Victory and the Mary Rose respectively). While constructing a new entrance to the Basin, Bentham introduced the innovation of an inverted masonry arch to tie together the walls on either side. He went on to use the same principle in constructing the new dry docks attached to the basin; it soon became standard for dock construction around the world. In constructing the docks and basin he made pioneering use of Smeaton's waterproof cement. He also designed a "ship caisson" to close off the entrance to the basin (another innovation which soon became a standard design).

To deal with the increasing number of docks, Bentham in 1797 proposed replacing one of the horse pumps above the reservoir with a steam engine. His plan was that the engine should be used not only to drain the reservoir (by night) but also to drive a sawmill and woodworking machinery (during the day); he also envisaged linking it to a freshwater well, to enable water to be pumped through a network of pipes to various parts of the dockyard. A table engine, designed by Bentham's staff chemist James Sadler, was installed in 1799; it represented the first use of steam power in a Royal Naval Yard. By 1800 a second steam engine (a Boulton & Watt beam engine) was being installed alongside the first. Meanwhile, Bentham designed and built a series of subterranean vaulted chambers over the reservoir, upon which he erected a pair of parallel three-storey workshops to contain reciprocating and circular saws, planning machines and morticing machines, built to his own designs, to be driven by the two engines (which were accommodated together with their boilers in the south workshop). Tanks installed on the upper floor provided a head of water for Bentham's aforementioned dockyard-wide pipe network, providing both salt water for firefighting and fresh water for various uses (including, for the first time, provision of drinking water to ships on the wharves) sourced from a newly sunk 274 ft well.

Between the two Wood Mills buildings a single-storey workshop was built in 1802 to accommodate what soon came to be recognised as the world's first steam-powered factory for mass production: Portsmouth Block Mills. Marc Brunel, father of Isambard Kingdom Brunel, famously designed the machines, which manufactured ships' pulley blocks through a total of fifteen separate stages of production. Having been presented with Brunel's designs, which would be built by Henry Maudslay, Bentham incorporated them into his woodworking complex and linked them to the engines by way of line shafts.

At the same time as building his Wood Mills, Bentham, with his deputy Simon Goodrich, was constructing a Metal Mills complex a little to the north-east. Alongside a smithery were a copper-smelting furnace and refinery, and a steam engine which drove a rolling mill and tilt hammers. Begun in 1801, these facilities were for recycling the copper sheathing of ships' hulls. In 1804 the works were extended to accommodate machinery for the rolling of iron to make bars and bolts. A millwrights' shop was also established nearby. The Wood Mills, Block Mills, Metal Mills and Millwrights' department were all placed under Goodrich's supervision as Mechanist to the Royal Navy.

Nineteenth century

In 1800, the Royal Navy had 684 ships and the Dockyard was the largest industrial complex in the world. In 1805 Horatio Nelson toured the newly opened block mills before embarking from Portsmouth on HMS Victory, leaving Britain for the last time before his death at the Battle of Trafalgar.

From 1814 wooden covers were built over some of the slips and docks, to designs by Robert Seppings.

From 1815 the system of Dockyard apprenticeship was supplemented by the establishment of a School of Naval Architecture in Portsmouth (for training potential Master Shipwrights), initially housed in the building which faces Admiralty House on South Terrace. Taking on students from the age of 14, this was the forerunner of Portsmouth Dockyard School (later Technical College) which continued to provide specialist training until 1970.

Victorian dockyard expansion
The adoption of steam propulsion for warships led to large-scale changes in the Royal Dockyards, which had been built in the age of sail. The Navy's first 'steam factory' was built at Woolwich in 1839; but it soon became clear that the site was far too small to cope with this revolutionary change in ship building and maintenance.

Therefore, in 1843, work began in Portsmouth on further reclamation of land to the north of the then Dockyard to create a new 7-acre basin (known today as No 2 Basin) with a sizeable factory alongside for manufacturing marine steam engines. The Steam Factory, on the western edge of the basin, housed a series of workshops: for construction and repair of boilers, for punching and shearing and for heavy turning; there was also an erecting shop for assembling the finished engines. The upper floor housed pattern shops, fitting shops and other light engineering workshops. Line shafts throughout were powered by an 80hp steam engine accommodated to the rear. A new Brass and Iron Foundry was also built soon afterwards, on the southern edge of the basin, and in 1852 the Great Steam Smithery was opened alongside the Steam Factory (where Bentham's Metal Mills had formerly stood), containing a pair of steam hammers designed by James Nasmyth. The infrastructure and buildings were designed by a group of Royal Engineer officers, overseen by Captains Sir William Denison and Henry James. (The new steam basin was built over what had been the boat pond and boat houses; so in 1845 a new facility (No 6 Boathouse) was built alongside the mast pond, to the south, which was converted into a boat pond.)

Three new dry docks were constructed over the next 20 years, opening off the new basin, and another was built on reclaimed land west of the basin, immediately north of the shipbuilding slips. The slips were now five in number, with Nos. 3-5 being covered by interlinking metal roofs (believed to have comprised the widest iron span in Britain when built in 1845). Meanwhile, facilities for building wooden hulls continued to be updated with a large sawmill having been built behind the slips in 1843.

Developments in shipbuilding technology, however, led to several of the new amenities having to be rebuilt and expanded (almost as soon as they were finished). A much larger Iron Foundry was opened in 1861, immediately to the east of its predecessor; it was further expanded in the following decade. In 1867 a very large Armour Plate Workshop was opened, filling the space between the new North and South dry docks on the eastern side of the basin.

In 1860 policing of the dockyard was also transferred to the new No. 2 Division of the Metropolitan Police, a role it fulfilled until 1933.

The 'Great Extension'

Technological change affected not only ships' means of propulsion, but the materials from which they were built. By 1860 wooden warships, vulnerable as they were to modern armaments, had been rendered largely obsolescent. The changeover to metal hulls not only required new building techniques, but also heralded a dramatic and ongoing increase in the potential size of new vessels. The Dockyards found themselves having to expand in kind. At Portsmouth, plans were drawn up in the late 1850s for further land reclamation north and east of the new Steam Basin, and from 1867 work was begun on a complex of three new interconnected basins, each of 14–22 acres. Each basin served a different purpose: ships would proceed from the repairing basin, to the rigging basin, to the fitting-out basin, and exit from there into a new tidal basin, ready to take on fuel alongside the sizeable coaling wharf there.

Three dry docks were also constructed as part of the plan, as well as parallel pair of sizeable locks for entry into the basin complex; the contemporary pumping station which stands nearby not only served to drain these docks and locks, but also delivered compressed air to power equipment around the edges of the basins: five cranes, seven caissons and forty capstans were run on compressed air from the pump house.

The "Great Extension" of Portsmouth Dockyard was largely completed by 1881. Alongside the new Basins new buildings were erected, on a huge scale, to accommodate new manufacturing and construction processes. These included a gun-mounting workshop (built alongside the pumping station in 1881) which produced gun turrets, and a torpedo workshop (built to the east of No 12 dock in 1886).

Before the end of the century, it was recognised that there would have to be still further expansion across all the Royal Dockyards in order to keep pace with the increasing likely size of future naval vessels. At Portsmouth two more dry docks, Nos 14 & 15, were built alongside the Repairing Basin in 1896; (within ten years these, together with the adjacent docks 12 & 13, had to be extended, and by the start of World War I Dock No 14 was over 720 ft in length).

The dockyard railway

In 1843 construction began on a railway system within the dockyard. In 1846 this was connected to Portsmouth Town railway station via what became known as the Admiralty Line. By 1952 there was over 27 miles of track within the dockyard. Its use declined in the 1970s: the link to the mainline was closed in 1977 and locomotives ceased operating within the yard the following year.

In 1876 a railway station was built on what became known as South Railway Jetty on Watering Island (west of the Semaphore Tower). It was served by a separate branch line which crossed the South Camber by way of a swing bridge and continued on a viaduct over the foreshore, joining the main line just east of Portsmouth Harbour railway station.

A small railway station and ornamental cast-iron shelter served in particular the needs of Queen Victoria and her family, who would often transfer from yacht to train at this location; this line soon became the main arrival/departure route for personnel. The swing bridge and viaduct were damaged in the wartime blitz and subsequently dismantled in 1946. The Royal Naval Railway Shelter has recently been moved to the other side of the island and restored.

Twentieth century
By the end of the 19th century No 5 Slip had been uncovered and extended (to a length of ) to become the yard's principal shipbuilding slip. At the same time the adjacent dry dock (No 9) was filled in to provide space for stacking steel plates, alongside which a further smithery (No 3 Engine Smithery) was erected in 1903. Meanwhile, slips 1-4 were repurposed (being no longer large enough for warship construction). Before long Nos 4 and 3 had been filled in, and the space beneath their cast iron covers converted into a shipbuilding workshop (No 3 Ship Shop); the neighbouring No 2 Slip was used for hauling up torpedo boat destroyers for a time, while No 1 was used as a boat slip.

In 1900 the Third class cruiser HMS Pandora was launched, followed by the armoured cruisers Kent in 1901 and Suffolk in 1903. Two battleships of the pre-Dreadnought King Edward VII Class were launched in 1904—Britannia and New Zealand.

Dreadnoughts

The first modern battleship, Dreadnought, was built in 1905–06, taking one day more than a year. Further dreadnoughts followed—Bellerophon in 1907, St. Vincent in 1908, Orion in 1910, King George V in 1911, Iron Duke in 1912 and Queen Elizabeth in 1913.

Electrification came to the Yard with the opening of a 9,800 kW power station in 1906. At this time the 1846 Steam Factory still served as the dockyard's main heavy engineering complex, but the following year a very large New Steam Factory (to the east of No 12 dock) was opened. Equipped for the repair and maintenance of steam turbine propulsion units, it was soon put to the task of fitting out dreadnoughts. Nearby a new boiler shop had recently been built (south of No 13 dock), together with a new sawmill. Dry-docking provision was further increased in 1912 through the addition of an Admiralty Floating Dock, large enough to accommodate a dreadnought, which was moored just off Fountain Lake Jetty. Also in 1912 No 5 Slip was further extended.

The largest Naval ships were now too large for the interlocking basins, so to guarantee access to the new dry docks the intervening walls between the basins were removed to create a single large non-tidal body of water (No 3 Basin), with a pair of 850 ft entrance locks being built at the same time. These (C & D locks) were operational from 1914, and they, together with the enlarged basin and docks, have remained in use, largely unaltered, ever since.
On 8 April 1913, Portsmouth Dockyard opened the first of two new large 850 ft long drydock locks directly connecting Portsmouth Harbour to No.3 Basin, the first named 'C' Lock. A year later, 'D' Lock was opened in April 1914.

First World War
The largest vessel launched at Portsmouth during World War I was the 27,500-ton battleship Royal Sovereign in 1915. The only other launchings during the war were the submarines J1 and J2 in 1915, and K1, K2 and K5 in 1916. Some 1,200 vessels, however, underwent a refit at Portsmouth during the course of the War, and over the same period 1,658 ships were either hauled up the slipways or placed in dry-dock for repairs.

For the duration of the war significant numbers of women were employed in the yard, including in the erstwhile male domains of the Engineering Department, the Electrical Department and the Constructive Department. By the end of the war a total of 2,122 women were employed; 280 worked as clerks, the rest were manual workers.

Inter-war years

The period after the war was inevitably a time of contraction at the Dockyard, and there were many redundancies. In accordance with the Government's Ten Year Rule the Dockyard worked over the next decade and a half with a presumption of enduring peace rather than future conflict.

The majority of warships launched at Portsmouth following the end of the War were cruisers—Effingham in 1921, Suffolk in 1926, London in 1927, Dorsetshire in 1929, Neptune in 1933, and Amphion and Aurora in 1934. There were also four destroyers—Comet and her sister Crusader in 1931, and the flotilla leaders Duncan in 1932 and Exmouth in 1934. The only other vessels launched between the wars were the mining tenders Nightingale in 1931 and Skylark in 1932.

In 1922 HMS Victory was brought into No 2 Dry Dock (where she remains to this day). She was opened to the public on 17 July 1928, and ten years later a museum building (the Victory Gallery) was opened nearby to house works of art and other items related to the ship (including W L Wyllie's Panorama of the Battle of Trafalgar).

New Dockyard facilities in this period included a Steel Foundry, built in 1926, and the Central Metallurgical Laboratory, established ten years later. The "Semaphore Tower" was opened in 1930, a facsimile of its namesake (dating from 1810–24) which had been destroyed in a fire in 1913. The arch beneath incorporates the Lion Gate, once part of the 18th-century fortifications. The original Semaphore Tower had been erected between a sizeable pair of buildings: the Rigging Store and Sail Loft (both of 1784), which perished in the same fire; in the end only one of the pair was rebuilt, as a five-storey office block. In 1937 work began on a new boathouse (No 4 Boathouse), which replaced the last working masthouse of the yard (in place there since c.1700). Construction was halted by the start of the Second World War, and the southern half of the new building was never completed; during the war it was fully occupied with building landing craft, small boats and midget submarines.

Second World War
The destroyer flotillas (the capital ships having been evacuated to Scapa Flow), were essential to the defence of the English Channel, particularly during Operation Dynamo (the Dunkirk evacuation) and against any potential German Invasion. The base itself served a major refit and repair role. The Germans realised this importance and the city and base in particular was heavily bombed.

Portsmouth and the Naval Base itself were the headquarters and main departure point for the military and naval units destined for Sword Beach on the Normandy coast as a part of Operation Overlord and the D-Day landings on 6 June 1944. Troops destined for each of the landing beaches left from Portsmouth aboard vessels such as the armed merchant cruisers HMCS Prince Henry and HMCS Prince David, escorted by the Canadian destroyers HMCS Algonquin and Sioux. The majority of the naval support for the operation left from Portsmouth, including the Mulberry Harbours. Boathouse 4 (built around the start of hostilities) contributed to the construction of landing craft and support vessels as well as more specialised craft such as midget submarines.

Post Second World War

There was much rebuilding, demolition and consolidation of bomb-damaged buildings in the aftermath of the Second World War. At the same time, a number of returning ships were refitted in the yard (while others were de-equipped, ready for scrapping). The Dockyard was kept busy with refitting and modernisation works through the 1950s and 60s. Private yards were used to a greater extent for shipbuilding, but five new frigates were launched at Portsmouth in this time. Numbers employed in the dockyard remained steadily above 16,000 through the 1950s and early '60s; but a Defence Review published in 1969 (after the withdrawal of British forces from east of Suez) signalled a significant reduction in the size of the fleet and a parallel downsizing of workforces in the Royal Dockyards.

In the decade that followed No 5 shipbuilding slip was taken out of commission; it was infilled (along with the other remaining slips at the north corner) and the adjacent buildings were demolished. Nevertheless, elsewhere in the yard a number of new workshops and other facilities were built in the 1970s, especially around Nos 12-15 docks (including a large Heavy Plate Shop, now the Steel Production Hall, built on the site of the Edwardian Boiler Shop).

In June 1981, however, the government announced that shipbuilding would cease at Portsmouth, that the workforce would be reduced from just under 7,000 to 1,225 and that the erstwhile Royal Dockyard would become a Fleet Maintenance & Repair Organisation (FMRO) with a minor support and repair role (Devonport and Rosyth would take over major refits and ship modernisation work). The run-down of the Dockyard was put on hold, however, at the start of the Falklands Conflict, with all available hands being put to the task of preparing the Falklands Task Force.

Falklands Task Force

In 1982 Argentina invaded the Falkland Islands. In response a task force of British military and merchant ships was dispatched from Portsmouth Naval Base to the islands in the South Atlantic to reclaim them for the United Kingdom.

The task force consisted of the following ships:

 Two aircraft carriers
 Two landing ship docks
 Eight destroyers
 Fifteen frigates
 Three patrol ships
 Five submarines
 Three survey vessels
 Five minesweepers
 Ten fleet tankers
 Six logistic landing ships
 Five supply ships
 One helicopter supply ship
 Eighteen merchant ships including troop/cruise ships such as Queen Elizabeth 2 and SS Canberra

Following some losses, the majority of these ships returned to Portsmouth later that year.

Rundown of the Dockyard

Thereafter, some of the cuts that had been proposed in the 1981 Defence White Paper were reversed. The retention of a larger fleet meant that a larger workforce was retained at Portsmouth than had been envisaged (around 2,800); however the run-down of the old Dockyard went ahead, with dry docks 1–7 being closed, just under half the dockside cranes demolished and ten out of the nineteen major workshops on the site taken out of service. The dockyard's 'Edwardian piece de résistance''', the Great Factory of 1905, ceased manufacturing in 1986 and was converted to serve as a warehouse (at the end of the century it was linked by monorail to other nearby buildings to create a large Central Storage and Distribution Facility).

In the older parts of the dockyard several buildings, ranging from storehouses to foundries, were converted for office use; this trend continued in later years. Similarly, the Great Steam Smithery (1852) adjoining the Steam Factory (aka No 2 Ship Shop) underwent conversion in 1993 to provide squash courts, offices, messrooms and a self-service laundry. In the same year, Victory Building, a new neo-Georgian office block, was opened on a prominent site facing the historic No 1 basin (just one of several new office blocks built across the dockyard site in each decade of the second half of the century); it accommodated staff of the Second Sea Lord, relocated there from London.

In 1998 the work of the FMRO was contracted out to the private sector in the shape of Fleet Support Limited.

 Twenty-first century

In the summer of 2005 Portsmouth Naval Base and the Solent played host to two special events organised as part of the Trafalgar 200 commemorations recognising the 200th Anniversary of the Battle of Trafalgar. These were the International Fleet Review and the International Festival of the Sea.

In 2007 it was reckoned that the Royal Navy/MOD directly employed 9,774 people at Portsmouth, of whom 5,680 were ships' crew and the rest either service personnel or civilian employees working in the naval base. In addition, there were 3,834 private-sector employees on the base, including defence contractors, sub-contractors and heritage-related workers.

Shipbuilding, maintenance and repair

Shipbuilding recommenced on the site in 2003 following the construction of a facility by VT Group on the site of No. 13 dry dock (having relocated there from the old Thornycroft Yard in Woolston, Southampton). Modular construction of warships took place in an interlinked complex of large buildings: the Steelwork Production Hall, the Unit Construction Hall and the Ship Assembly Hall. Construction of modules for the Type 45 destroyers and Queen Elizabeth-class aircraft carriers took place here, latterly under BAE Systems Maritime – Naval Ships. The project was intended to secure the base's future for the next forty years and revitalise shipbuilding in the city; but in 2013 it was announced that, due to budget cuts, the shipbuilding facility in Portsmouth would close in favour of BAE keeping its yards in Glasgow open. (There was speculation at the time that this was to help retain Scotland in the union during the 2014 Scottish independence referendum.)

BAE Systems, having subsumed Fleet Support Ltd, continues to manage ship repair and maintenance facilities around No. 3 Basin at Portsmouth. As of 2016 the former shipbuilding complex was being used for repairing minehunters and other small craft.

New aircraft carriers

In 2013 a £100 million upgrade of the naval base facilities and harbour was begun, in preparation for the arrival of the two Queen Elizabeth-class aircraft carriers (Portsmouth having been chosen to serve as their home base). These ships required the harbour to be dredged to allow safe entry and exit. Victory Jetty and the Middle Slip Jetty were strengthened and upgraded (the latter being renamed Princess Royal Jetty on completion of the works), so as to enable both carriers to lay alongside at the same time. HMS Queen Elizabeth arrived in Portsmouth in 2017, and HMS Prince of Wales followed two years later.

Civil and military administration of the Dockyard

From 1546 until 1832 prime responsibility for administering H.M. Royal Navy Dockyards lay with the Navy Board, and resident commissioners who were naval officers though civilian employees of the Navy Board, not sea officers   in charge of the day-to-day operational running of the dockyard and superintendence of its staff, following the abolition of that board its functions were merged within the Admiralty and a new post styled Admiral-superintendent was established the admiral-superintendent usually held the rank of rear-admiral though sometimes vice-admiral. His immediate subordinate was an officer known as the captain of the dockyard (or captain of the port from 1969). This followed the appointment of a (civilian) Chief Executive of the Royal Dockyards in September 1969 and the creation of a centralised Royal Dockyards Management Board. Admiral-superintendents ceased to be appointed in the royal navy after 15 September 1971, and existing post-holders were renamed port admirals. In May 1971 the post was renamed Flag Officer, Portsmouth and Admiral Superintendent until July 1971 when it was renamed Flag Officer, Spithead and Port Admiral until August 1975, the post name was changed again to Flag Officer, Portsmouth and Port Admiral until October 1996 when it ceased to exist as a separate command that was then absorbed into the First Flotilla Command later renamed Portsmouth Flotilla.

The Naval Barracks (HMS Nelson)

In 1847 a barracks was built within the Duke of York bastion of the 18th-century Portsea fortifications, east of the dockyard, to house troops manning the town's defences. It was named Anglesey (or Anglesea) Barracks. The bastion was demolished in 1870-76.

In 1899 the Admiralty purchased these barracks from the War Office and constructed a Naval Barracks on the site, designed by Colonel Sir Henry Pilkington RE. (Prior to this, Royal Navy personnel in Portsmouth had been accommodated either on commissioned vessels or in hulks). Opened in 1903, the barracks were commissioned as HMS Victory (but renamed HMS Nelson in 1974 to avoid confusion with the flagship). A Wardroom (with accommodation for officers) was built across the street on the site of the old garrison hospital. In 1906 the nearby Holy Trinity Parish Church was purchased and brought inside the perimeter wall; for a time it functioned as the RN Barracks chapel, but it was destroyed by bombs in the Second World War. Just to the north-west, Anchor Gate House was built in 1898 to house the Commodore of the Barracks.

Several barrack blocks were demolished and rebuilt in the latter half of the 20th century, but a number of original buildings remain including the canteen (Eastney block), the drill hall and gymnasium, Jervis block (formerly Seamen's Quarters), Barham block (formerly Depot Offices) and the Wardroom. In addition, one barrack block remains, along with its adjacent canteen building, from the earlier Army barracks (Anglesey Barracks) which formerly stood on the site. Nearby, the associated garrison prison (which later served as the Naval Detention Centre) is now home to the Royal Marines School of Music.

In November 2016 the Ministry of Defence published A Better Defence Estate, which indicated that the HMS Nelson Wardroom would be disposed of by 2021; three years later, however, the disposal date was deferred.

 Associated establishments in the Portsmouth area
The presence of the Dockyard and Fleet led to the establishment of a variety of other naval and military installations in and around Portsmouth over the years, some of which are listed below.

Naval

: a Royal Naval Reserve unit located in the renovated "Semaphore Tower".
: Whale Island, Portsmouth (includes Navy Command Headquarters together with a front-line Naval Training establishment operated by Babcock International (with all catering, front of house, cleaning and hotel services sub-contracted to Compass Group plc)). The name was formerly attached to the barracks and other facilities of the RN Gunnery Establishment (based on the island from 1891 to 1985); these now form part of the training base.
HMS Temeraire: Burnaby Road, Portsmouth. Training of Naval Physical Training Instructors and sports grounds and facilities for Portsmouth-based personnel. RN School of Physical Training has been known as Temeraire since 1971, and moved to its current site in 1988.
: Fareham. Naval training provided mainly under contract to Babcock International (catering and cleaning services are sub-contracted to Sodexo). Commissioned in 1940 as a training establishment for 'new entry' seamen, it later housed the RN School of Electrical Engineering, but serves today as headquarters of the Maritime Warfare School.
: Gosport. Naval (and tri-service) training, home of the centre of excellence for mechanical and electrical engineering. Naval training provided mainly under contract to Babcock International (catering and cleaning services are sub-contracted to Sodexo); opened on this site in 1956.
Institute of Naval Medicine, Gosport.
Marchwood Military Port, Southampton Water. Royal Fleet Auxiliary base-port.

 Decommissioned

: Now MOD Southwick Park—Tri-Service Defence School of Policing and Guarding
 diesel electric submarine base—Now MOD Fort Blockhouse
 HM Gun Wharf, later  torpedo and mines establishment — Now in civilian use as Gunwharf Quays
HMS Daedalus Fleet Air Arm base
Royal Naval Hospital, Haslar
Eastney Barracks (Royal Marine Artillery barracks 1867–1923, Royal Marines barracks 1923–1995) — converted into housing.
Forton Barracks (Royal Marine Light Infantry barracks 1848–1923, then  boys' training establishment until 1968) — Now in civilian use as St Vincent College
Royal Clarence Victualling Yard, Gosport
RNAD Gosport: a composite site which included:
 RNAD Priddy's Hard (1776) gunpowder storage and shell-filling facility. Closed 1988 — now Explosion! Museum of Naval Firepower
 RNAD Bedenham (1908) gunpowder stores were moved here from Priddy's Hard (judged to be dangerously close to the Dockyard).
 RNAD Elson (now part of DM Gosport)
 RNAD Frater (now part of DM Gosport)
 RNAD Marchwood (1811) closed 1961 – Converted for housing and use by Marchwood Yacht Club
Haslar Gunboat Yard (opened 1859, closed 1973)
: RN Signals School 1941–1993, Leydene House, East Meon, near Portsmouth
: Fire fighting training establishment 1946–1993, now part of HMS Excellent''

Military

The Fortifications of Portsmouth were developed over several centuries to protect the fleet and dockyard from attacks either by land or by sea. From 1665 Bernard de Gomme oversaw construction of defensive Lines around both Portsmouth (the Dockyard and the old town) and Gosport (on the opposite side of Portsmouth Harbour). These defences were extended in the 18th century, before being superseded in the 19th by the Palmerston forts which encircle Portsmouth on and off-shore.

These fortifications required substantial numbers of personnel to man them and, from the mid-18th century onwards, they (together with other troops who were either stationed in the garrison or preparing to embark overseas) were accommodated in a variety of barracks in and around the city. By 1900 these included:

 Cambridge Barracks, High Street (Infantry) – established in 1825 in a set of late-18th century warehouses; the officers' quarters have been occupied by Portsmouth Grammar School since 1926.
 Clarence Barracks (Royal Garrison Artillery) – established in 1760 as Fourhouse Barracks on land between St Nicholas Street and the fortifications (alongside an earlier Royal Marine Barracks); renamed in 1827; rebuilt around 1881, expanding across the old defensive lines into the field beyond; demolished c.1967.
 Colewort Barracks, St George's Road (Army Service Corps) – built as a garrison hospital, converted to barracks 1694, demolished to make way for expansion of nearby power station in the 1920s.
 Hilsea Barracks (Royal Field Artillery) – built 1854, Royal Army Ordnance Corps from 1921; closed 1962, site redeveloped for housing (the surviving 18th-century Gatcombe House served as the Officers' Mess).
 Milldam Barracks (Royal Engineers) – built late 18th century onwards, housed the Engineers responsible for upkeep of the fortifications; sold in 1969 and now occupied by the University of Portsmouth and Portsmouth Register Office.
 Point Barracks (Artillery) – built alongside the medieval Round Tower in 1846–50; sold to Portsmouth City Council in the early 1960s following disbandment of the UK's Coastal Artillery network. Part of the brick structure was demolished, but is marked by stones in the ground alongside the surviving casemates.
 St George Barracks, Gosport (Infantry) – built 1856–59 as a transit barracks for troops, continuing in military use until 1991; several buildings remain, since converted to new uses.
 Victoria Barracks (Infantry) – built in 1888 alongside New Clarence Barracks; demolished 1967.
According to the census over 6,000 men were living in barracks in the Portsmouth area in 1911.

Naval Base Commander (Portsmouth)

The head of HMNB Portsmouth is titled Naval Base Commander (Portsmouth).

 2011-2012: Commodore Tony Radakin
 2012–2018: Commodore Jeremy Rigby
 2018–2019: Commodore Jim Higham
 2019–2022: Commodore Jeremy Bailey
 2022–present: Commodore John Voyce OBE

(decorations and ranks detailed at the time of being in Command, and do not reflect subsequent promotions, or honours and awards)

See also
 Portsmouth Dockyard (Tissot), 1877 painting

References

Bibliography

Further reading

External links

 UKHO Charts of Portsmouth Harbour and Approaches
 Portsmouth Royal Dockyard Historical Trust website
 Portsmouth Historic Dockyard website
 Portsmouth Naval Base Property Trust
 Portsmouth D-Day Museum
 Queen's Harbour Master, Portsmouth
 A Geometrical Plan, & West Elevation of His Majesty's Dock-Yard, near Portsmouth, with Part of the Common, &c., dated 1754 (Pierre-Charles Canot after Thomas Milton and John Cleveley the Elder)

Royal Navy dockyards in England
Royal Navy bases in Hampshire
Organisations based in Portsmouth
Ports and harbours of Hampshire
Maritime museums in England
Museums in Portsmouth
Tourist attractions in Hampshire

HMNB Portsmouth


A katsa is a field officer of the Mossad, the national intelligence agency of Israel. A katsa collects information and runs agents.

Operation

The word katsa is a Hebrew acronym for Ktsin Issuf, meaning "Collections Officer." There are typically 30–40 katsas at a time, operating around the world.

Training

In searching for candidates, the Mossad administers a variety of psychological and aptitude tests, as well as assessing their own current needs. If selected, a candidate must go through and pass the Mossad training academy, the Midrasha, located near the town of Herzliya. The Mossad academy is the official summer residence of the Israeli Prime Minister. There they are taught the tradecraft of intelligence gathering for approximately three years.  The main priority of training is to teach katsas how to find, recruit, and cultivate agents, including how to clandestinely communicate with them.  They also learn how to avoid being the subject of foreign counter-intelligence, by avoiding car and foot surveillance, by killing, and by preventing foreign agents from creating 'traps' at meetings. Once training is completed, trainees will spend an apprenticeship period working on varying projects before becoming full-fledged katsas.

Known and possible katsas

Eli Cohen: developed close relationships with the political and military hierarchy of Syria during the early 60s and was later executed.
Michael Harari: Led a group of Mossad officers who mistakenly killed an innocent waiter in the Lillehammer affair in 1973.
Mossad officers also involved in Lillehammer affair:
Dan Aerbel
Abraham Gehmer a.k.a. Leslie Orbaum
Zwi Steinberg
Michael Dorf
Marianne Gladnikoff
Sylvia Rafael a.k.a. Patricia Lesley Roxburgh
Angelus Askari a.k.a. Ghost
Yossi Cohen

Related pages
Sayanim
Bodel

References

Thomas, Gordon. Martin, Dillon. Robert Maxwell, Israel's Superspy: The Life and Murder of a Media Mogul. New York: Carroll & Graf Publishers, 2002.

Other websites
Official website of Mossad, used for recruiting personnel
English version

Mossad

Katsa (Mossad)


Rudy is a 1993 American biographical sports film directed by David Anspaugh. It is an account of the life of Daniel "Rudy" Ruettiger, who harbored dreams of playing football at the University of Notre Dame despite significant obstacles. It was the first film that the Notre Dame administration allowed to be shot on campus since Knute Rockne, All American in 1940.

In 2005, Rudy was named one of the best 25 sports movies of the previous 25 years in two polls by ESPN (#24 by a panel of sports experts, and #4 by ESPN.com users). It was ranked the 54th-most inspiring film of all time in the American Film Institute's "100 Years" series.

The film premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival on September 18, 1993, and was released in the United States on October 13, 1993, by TriStar Pictures. It stars Sean Astin as the title character, along with Ned Beatty, Jason Miller, Robert Prosky and Charles S. Dutton. The film had supporting roles from Jon Favreau and Vince Vaughn, being both actors' first film roles. The script was written by Angelo Pizzo, who created Hoosiers (1986), which was also directed by Anspaugh.

Plot
In the late 1960s in Joliet, Illinois, Daniel Eugene "Rudy" Ruettiger dreams of playing football at Notre Dame. However, he lacks the grades and money to attend and the talent and physical stature to play major college football. Following high school, he works at a steel mill with his father, a Notre Dame fan, and his older brother. When his supportive best friend Pete is killed in a mill explosion, Rudy decides to follow his dream.

In 1972, Rudy visits Notre Dame but is not academically eligible to enroll. With the help of local priest and former Notre Dame president Father John Cavanaugh, Rudy enrolls at nearby Holy Cross College, hoping to transfer. He approaches Fortune, head groundskeeper at Notre Dame Stadium, and is given a job. Homeless, Rudy sneaks into Fortune's office through a window to sleep on a cot; initially indifferent to Rudy's plight, Fortune later leaves him with blankets and a key to the office. Rudy learns that Fortune, despite working at the stadium for years, has never seen a Notre Dame football game.

Rudy befriends teaching assistant D-Bob, who helps him study in return for Rudy's helping him socially with girls.  D-Bob tests Rudy for a learning disability; the results indicate that Rudy suffers from dyslexia, which he then overcomes to become a better student. At Christmas, Rudy returns home to find that his family appreciates his college academic achievements, although his brother Frank still mocks him for his attempts to play college football. Rudy persists, and even losing his girlfriend to his older brother Johnny does not deter him.

After two years at Holy Cross and three rejections from Notre Dame, Rudy is finally admitted and attends football tryouts in the hope of making the team as a "walk-on." Assistant coach Joe Yonto warns the walk-ons that 35 scholarship players will not even make the "dress roster" of players who take the field during games. However, he notices Rudy's determination and gives him a spot on the daily practice squad. Rudy tells Fortune and persuades him to promise to see Rudy's first game.

Playing well, Rudy convinces head coach Ara Parseghian to let him suit up for one home game in his senior year, but Parseghian retires following the 1974 season. He is replaced by former NFL coach Dan Devine, who refuses to put Rudy on the game-day roster. Frustrated by not being on the dress list for the last home game, Rudy quits the team.

Fortune finds a distraught Rudy and reveals he had actually played for Notre Dame years earlier. However, Fortune quit the team because he felt his skin color kept him from playing; he has regretted this decision ever since. Reminded that he has nothing to prove to anyone but himself and will forever regret quitting, Rudy returns to the team. Each of his fellow seniors, led by team captain and All-American Roland Steele, lines up to lay his jersey on Devine's desk. Each player requests that Rudy be allowed to dress in his place for the season's final game. Devine lets Rudy suit up against Georgia Tech.

With Rudy's family and D-Bob in attendance, Steele invites Rudy to lead the team onto the field, and Fortune is there to see the game as promised. With Notre Dame leading 17–3 in the fourth quarter, Devine sends all the seniors into the game except Rudy, despite Steele's and the assistant coaches' urging. Fans are aware of Rudy's goal from a story in the student newspaper, and a "Rudy!" chant begins in the stadium. Hearing this, the Notre Dame offense, led by tailback Jamie O'Hara, overrules Devine's call for victory formation and scores a quick touchdown. This gives defensive player Rudy a chance to get in the game and be entered onto the Fighting Irish roster. Devine finally lets Rudy play on the Notre Dame kickoff to Georgia Tech. Rudy stays in for the final play, sacks the Georgia Tech quarterback, and is carried off the field on his teammates' shoulders to cheers from the stadium.

An epilogue states that since 1975, no other Notre Dame player has been carried off the field as of the time of the film's release in 1993. Rudy graduated in 1976, and five of his younger brothers went on to earn college degrees.

Cast
Sean Astin as Daniel "Rudy" Ruettiger
Jon Favreau as Dennis "D-Bob" McGowan
Ned Beatty as Daniel Ruettiger, Sr.
Charles S. Dutton as Fortune
Robert Prosky as Father John Cavanaugh
Jason Miller as Coach Ara Parseghian
Lili Taylor as Sherry
Mitch Rouse as Jim
John Beasley as Assistant Coach Warren
Vince Vaughn as Jamie O'Hara (Credited as "Vincent Vaughn")
Scott Benjaminson as Frank
John Duda as Young Frank
Kevin Duda as 9-year-old Bernie
Jake Armstrong as 13-year-old Bernie
Chelcie Ross as Coach Dan Devine
Ron Dean as Assistant Coach Joe Yonto
Rudy Ruettiger – Cameo in a picture at the end of the movie, and in a crowd scene at the Georgia Tech game, behind Ned Beatty
Greta Lind as Mary
 Christopher Reed as Pete
Gerry Becker as Father Ted
Diana James as Pick-up Girl #1
Mindy Hester as Pick-up Girl #2

Soundtrack

The soundtrack to Rudy was composed and conducted by veteran composer Jerry Goldsmith. Goldsmith had previously worked with filmmakers Angelo Pizzo and David Anspaugh on their successful 1986 film Hoosiers, garnering the film an Oscar nomination for Best Original Score and thus making Goldsmith their first choice to compose a soundtrack for Rudy.

 "Main Title" (3:35)
 "A Start"(2:27)
 "Waiting" (2:35)
 "Back on the Field" (2:07)
 "To Notre Dame" (6:55)
 "Tryouts" (4:27)
 "The Key" (3:55)
 "Take Us Out" (1:51)
 "The Plaque" (2:36)
 "The Final Game" (6:16)

According to Soundtrack.net, "Tryouts" has been used in 12 trailers, including those for Angels in the Outfield, BASEketball, The Deep End of the Ocean, Good Will Hunting, The Little Vampire, Mafia!, Seabiscuit and Spirit: Stallion of the Cimarron.

In 2008, Senator John McCain used "Take Us Out" as an official anthem during his presidential run. The piece of music was played at major events such as after Senator McCain's acceptance speech to the Republican National Convention and after John McCain announced Governor Sarah Palin as his running mate in Dayton, Ohio.

"Take Us Out" was played in the pilot episode of About a Boy, based on the 2002 film of the same name.

Also recorded in the film are performances of various Notre Dame fight songs by the Notre Dame Glee Club.

Production
Ruettiger decided to sell his story in 1986 and wanted Pizzo to write a script. Pizzo initially refused as he hated Notre Dame and didn't want anything to do with them but Ruettiger managed to convince him to write it. The film was shot in Illinois and Indiana.

Historical accuracy
In reality, Coach Dan Devine had announced that Rudy would dress for the Georgia Tech game during practice a few days before. The dramatic scene in which Rudy's senior teammates laid their jerseys on Devine's desk in protest never happened. According to Ruettiger, Devine was persuaded to allow him to dress only after a number of senior players requested that he do so. Devine had agreed to be depicted as the "heavy" in the film for dramatic effect but was chagrined to find out the extent to which he was vilified, saying: "The jersey scene is unforgivable. It's a lie and untrue."

As a guest on The Dan Patrick Show on September 8, 2010, Joe Montana, who was an active member of the team when Ruettiger played in the Georgia Tech game, confirmed that the jersey scene never happened, stating: "It's a movie, remember. Not all of that is true...The crowd wasn't chanting, nobody threw in their jerseys. He did get in the ball game. He got carried off after the game."

Nearly 10 years later in an interview on Barstool Sports' Pardon My Take podcast, Montana reiterated that the jersey scene and crowd chanting did not actually occur. He also implied that carrying Ruettiger off the field was sarcastic rather than celebratory, saying: "Was there a lot of things that happened? Yeah. He got in, he got a sack. Was the crowd chanting? No. Did I throw in my jersey? No. Did he get carried off the field? He got carried off by three of the biggest pranksters on the team."

Reception
The film was the closing night gala at the 1993 Toronto International Film Festival.

Rudy received primarily positive reviews from critics. Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times wrote that the film "has a freshness and an earnestness that gets us involved, and by the end of the film we accept Rudy's dream as more than simply sports sentiment. It's a small but powerful illustration of the human spirit." Stephen Holden of The New York Times observed that "For all its patness, the movie also has a gritty realism that is not found in many higher-priced versions of the same thing, and its happy ending is not the typical Hollywood leap into fantasy." In The Washington Post, Richard Harrington called Rudy "a sweet-natured family drama in which years of effort are rewarded by a brief moment of glory." Kenneth Turan of the Los Angeles Times called the film "Sweet-natured and unsurprising...this is one of those Never Say Die, I Gotta Be Me, Somebody Up There Likes Me sports movies that no amount of cynicism can make much of a dent in." On Rotten Tomatoes, the film holds a rating of 78%, based on 46 reviews, with an average rating of 6.9/10. The site's consensus reads, "Though undeniably sentimental and predictable, Rudy succeeds with an uplifting spirit and determination." Metacritic gave the film a score of 71, based on 22 reviews, indicating "generally favorable reviews".

In 2006, AFI placed the film on its 100 Years...100 Cheers list, where it was ranked #54.

Home media
Rudy was released on VHS by Columbia TriStar Home Video on May 25, 1994, and on LaserDisc on June 22, 1994. The film was released as a Special Edition DVD on September 26, 2000. The film was released on Blu-Ray for the first time on September 9, 2008.

See also
 List of American football films

References

Notes

External links

1990s biographical drama films
1993 drama films
1993 films
American biographical drama films
American football films
Biographical films about sportspeople
Cultural depictions of American men
Cultural depictions of players of American football
Films about the education system in the United States
Films about disability in the United States
Films directed by David Anspaugh
Films scored by Jerry Goldsmith
Films set in 1975
Films set in Illinois
Films set in Indiana
Films set in the 1970s
Films set in universities and colleges
Films shot in Illinois
Films shot in Indiana
Notre Dame Fighting Irish football
Sports films based on actual events
TriStar Pictures films
1990s English-language films
1990s American films
College football in fiction

Rudy (film)


Salix viminalis, the basket willow, common osier or osier, is a species of willow native to Europe, Western Asia, and the Himalayas.

Description
Salix viminalis is a multistemmed shrub growing to between  (rarely to ) tall. It has long, erect, straight branches with greenish-grey bark. The leaves long and slender, 10–25 cm long but only 0.5–2 cm broad; they are dark green above, with a silky grey-haired underside. The flowers are catkins, produced in early spring before the leaves; they are dioecious, with male and female catkins on separate plants. The male catkins are yellow and oval-shaped; the female catkins are longer and more cylindrical; they mature in early summer when the fruit capsules split open to release the numerous minute seeds.

Distribution and habitat
It is commonly found by streams and other wet places. The exact native range is uncertain due to extensive historical cultivation; it is certainly native from central Europe east to western Asia, but may also be native as far west as southeastern England. As a cultivated or naturalised plant, it is widespread throughout both Britain and Ireland, but only at lower altitudes. It is one of the least variable willows, but it will hybridise with several other species.

Uses
Along with other related willows, the flexible twigs (called withies) are commonly used in basketry, giving rise to its alternative common name of "basket willow". Cultivation and use of the common osier was common in England in the 18th and 19th century, with osier beds lining many rivers and streams. In the Chilean village of Chimbarongo, it is used to fashion their renowned baskets.

Another increasing use is in energy forestry, effluent treatment, in wastewater gardens, and in cadmium phytoremediation for water purification.

Salix viminalis is a known hyperaccumulator of  cadmium, chromium, lead, mercury, petroleum hydrocarbons, organic solvents, MTBE, TCE and byproducts, selenium, silver, uranium, and zinc, and as such is a prime candidate for phytoremediation. For more information, see the list of hyperaccumulators.

Ecology

Among the most common pathogens on S. viminalis are Melampsora spp. Female plants are more severely infected than male plants.

References

External links

viminalis
Flora of Europe
Flora of temperate Asia
Flora of tropical Asia
Phytoremediation plants
Plants described in 1753
Taxa named by Carl Linnaeus

Salix viminalis


Mikhail Nikolayevich Ostrovsky (; 1827–1901) was a Russian statesman who served as Minister of State Property (a post roughly equivalent to the American position of Secretary of the Interior) during the reign of Alexander III.

Early life and career
Ostrovsky was born March 30 (April 11 new style), 1827, in the Zamoskvorechye District of Moscow. His father was a first-generation nobleman of the church estate, and his older brother Alexander Ostrovsky became a noted playwright.

Ostrovsky studied at the First Moscow Gymnasium and in 1848 was graduated from Moscow Imperial University. He entered government service in the office of the Civil Governor of Simbirsk, assisting Auditor General V. A. Tatarinov in the introduction of auditing reforms.

From April 17, 1871 to 1878, Ostrovsky was Associate State Comptroller. He was assigned to perform audits in Vladimir, Tula, Kaluga, Yaroslavl, Kostroma, Pskov, Vilna, Grodno, Kovno Province, and the former Kingdom of Poland (then a Russian possession). In 1877 he performed a field audit of the Caucasus Army.

Later achievements and honors
In 1872, Ostrovsky was a made a senator, and in 1878 a member of the State Council of Imperial Russia.

From May 4, 1881 to January 1, 1893, Ostrovsky was Minister of State Property. He was in office in 1888 when an important law on the protection of forests was proclaimed.

From January 1, 1893 to October 3, 1899, Ostrovsky was chairman of the Department of Legislation of the State Council.

By an Imperial Rescript of April 26, 1899, Ostrovsky was made a Chevalier of the Order of St. Andrew.

Ostrovsky was an honorary member of the Imperial Academy of Sciences, Chairman of the Museum of Applied Knowledge in St. Petersburg, and (from May 15, 1883) an Actual Privy Counsellor, a civilian rank equivalent to full general or admiral.

Ostrovsky died July 25 (August 7 new style), 1901, in St. Petersburg. His funeral was held July 28 in the Holy Spirit Church of Alexander Nevsky Monastery, and was attended by Ivan Durnovo (Chairman of the Council of Ministers) and others. He was buried in the monastery, in St. Nicholas Cemetery.

References

Notes

External links

Obituary, Правительственный Вѣстникъ. , № 163, p. 3

1827 births
1901 deaths
Politicians from Moscow
Politicians from the Russian Empire
Members of the State Council (Russian Empire)

Mikhail Nikolayevich Ostrovsky


Nicholas Wanostrocht (5 October 1804 – 3 September 1876), known as Nicholas Felix, was an English amateur "gentleman" cricketer. He was one of the few players who – at his request – was routinely known by his pseudonym, Felix. When his father died in 1824 he had inherited the running of his school, aged only nineteen, and he was afraid that the parents of pupils might think that cricket was too frivolous a pastime for a schoolmaster.

Felix was a specialist left-handed batsman, although he did occasionally bowl underarm slow left-arm orthodox. He was a mainstay of the great Kent team of the mid-19th century alongside such players as Alfred Mynn, Fuller Pilch, William Hillyer and Ned Wenman. In the words of the famous elegy, best loved of Bernard Darwin,

And with five such mighty cricketers 'twas but natural to win
As Felix, Wenman, Hillyer, Fuller Pilch and Alfred Mynn.

Felix played for Kent from 1830 until 1852.  He also appeared for MCC sides and was a member of William Clarke's All-England Eleven.

In his overall first-class career, Felix played in 149 matches and scored 4,556 runs with a highest score of 113. He played at a time when prevailing conditions greatly favoured bowlers and was rated very highly as a batsman by his contemporaries.

He was the author of a famous instruction book: Felix on the Bat published in 1845. He also invented the catapulta (a bowling machine) as well as India-rubber batting gloves. A man of many talents, he was also a classical scholar, musician, linguist, inventor, writer and artist.

Felix died at Wimborne Minster in Dorset and is buried in Wimborne cemetery.

References

 Scores & Biographies, Volume 1 by Arthur Haygarth
 Barclays' World of Cricket – 2nd Edition, 1980, Collins Publishers, , p. 10.

External links

 Felix on the Bat

English cricketers
Kent cricketers
Marylebone Cricket Club cricketers
All-England Eleven cricketers
Surrey cricketers
Gentlemen cricketers
North v South cricketers
English cricketers of 1826 to 1863
1804 births
1876 deaths
Cricket historians and writers
Surrey Club cricketers
Left-Handed v Right-Handed cricketers
Married v Single cricketers
Nicholas Felix's XI cricketers
Fast v Slow cricketers
Gentlemen of Kent cricketers
Sportspeople from Camberwell

Nicholas Felix


Xavier Oriach (born 20 November 1927) is a French painter and engraver from Catalonia.  He is best known for his association with the School of Paris.

Biography
Oriach was born in Sabadell in Catalonia; his family established itself there in the fifteenth century. when his ancestors, the Oriacs of the Massif Central, settled in the area.  His parents moved to Barcelona in 1930 to start a fashion house; they were accompanied there by Oriach's granduncle, the modernist photographer Albert Rifà.  When his parents moved again, this time to Valencia, in 1934 to open a factory, Xavier returned with his great-uncle to Sabadell, spending much of the rest of his childhood in Rifà's studio.  Encouraged by the succession of artists that frequented the atelier, Oriach began to draw and paint at the end of the 1930s.

In 1943 Oriach left his home village to rejoin his parents, working for a time in his father's business; it was his father that suggested he take drawing lessons.  Consequently, in 1944 he entered the Fine Arts School of Valencia; it was there, in 1947, that he participated in the foundation of the avant-garde group Z.  He began to incorporate elements of Fauvism into his work.  The local French Institute accorded him a scholarship, which was enough to allow him, after a first exhibition of his work in Catalonia, to flee Francoist Spain.

In January 1951, Oriach settled in Paris, accompanied by his friend, guitarist Narciso Yepes.  To continue painting he began experimenting with more diverse styles.  He had, in his youth, met Antoni Clavé in Barcelona, and had known Manolo Gil in Valencia; in Paris he also came to know Antoni Tàpies, Eduardo Chillida, and Palazuelo.  Some months after arriving he attracted the interest of Bernard Dorival, who invited him to the retrospective of Georges Braque then being organized at the Musée National d'Art Moderne.  In 1953 Oriach was shown at the Galerie Breteau; not long afterwards he became involved in the New School of Paris, showing both at the Salon des Réalités Nouvelles ainsi and the Salon de Mai.

During the 1950s the Francoist State attempted to entice various artists in exile to return to Spain; notwithstanding the fact that most of the artists in question were ideologically opposed to the state it was hoped that such liberalization would help soften the government's image abroad.  Nevertheless, Oriach refused to return; when he did leave Paris in 1979 it was only to establish himself at Jouy-sur-Eure (Normandy), where he had gone regularly since his arrival in France.  There he turned his studio into a place for meetings and debates, creating a center for contemporary art where he showed the work of friends such as Pierre Tal Coat, Raoul Ubac, and Tàpies; he also founded a biennial for sculpture.

In 1991 Oriach moved again, this time to Normandy, where several retrospectives of his work have been organized; he also shows regularly in his native Catalonia.

Work
Arriving in Paris as realism was losing favor, Oriach soon threw himself into the study of abstraction.  Leaving aside the naturalism of his early style, he chose instead to focus on more nebulous, less concrete subjects.  His work gradually grew larger, but has remained precise, combining elements of Catalan, French, and Spanish culture.

References
This article is based on the article in the French Wikipedia.

1927 births
Living people
People from Sabadell
20th-century French painters
20th-century French male artists
French male painters
21st-century French painters
21st-century French male artists

Xavier Oriach


In the National Football League (NFL), the franchise tag is a designation a team may apply to a player scheduled to become an unrestricted free agent. The tag binds the player to the team for one year if certain conditions are met. Each team has one franchise tag (of either the exclusive or non-exclusive forms) and one transition tag per year. In most seasons, the transition tag can only be used if the team does not use a franchise tag; with exceptions as stipulated in the Collective Bargaining Agreement (CBA). For example, Article 10 of the CBA signed in 2011 stipulated that, in the Final League Year, teams were allowed to use both the franchise tag and transition tag for the 2020 NFL season.

The tag option allows NFL franchises to retain a "franchise player" who is valuable to a franchise. The one-year, guaranteed contract that is offered to the player is a known, non-negotiated salary. If a designated player does not sign the offer and is unable or unwilling to negotiate an alternative contract before week 10 of the designated season, the player is unable to sign or negotiate a contract in the NFL for the remainder of the season.

The franchise tag provides general managers and owners a strategic way to manage salary costs and limit exposure to the financial risks associated with a long-term contract. Unsurprisingly, many designated players have criticized the use of the franchise tag by teams when it restricts their perceived ability to negotiate a more lucrative contract.

Background
The National Football League introduced the franchise tag in 1993. There are two types of franchise tag designation: the exclusive rights franchise tag, and the non-exclusive rights franchise tag:

 An "exclusive" franchise player must be offered a one-year contract for an amount no less than the average of the top five salaries at the player's position as of a date in April of the current year in which the tag will apply, or 120 percent of the player's previous year's salary, whichever is greater. Exclusive franchise players cannot negotiate with other teams. The player's team has all the negotiating rights to the exclusive player.
 A "non-exclusive" franchise player must be offered a one-year contract for an amount no less than the average of the top five cap hits at the player's position for the previous five years applied to the current salary cap, or 120 percent of the player's previous year's salary, whichever is greater. A non-exclusive franchise player may negotiate with other NFL teams, but if the player signs an offer from another team, the original team has a right to match the terms of that offer, or if it does not match the offer and thus loses the player, is entitled to receive two first-round draft picks as compensation.
 Under the capped years, a team can designate one additional player with a transition tag. A transition player must be offered a minimum of the average of the top 10 salaries of the prior season at the player's position or 120 percent of the player's prior year's salary, whichever is greater. A transition player designation gives the club a first-refusal right to match, within seven days, an offer sheet given to the player by another club after his contract expires. If the club matches, it retains the player. If it does not match, it receives no compensation.
 Consecutive franchise tags are allowed, unless the player and club have agreed to a "no franchise tag" clause in his most recent contract and/or the contract is otherwise structured in such a way as to prevent its use. For any player to be tagged in two straight years, the team must pay 120 percent of the player's previous salary. If tagged in three straight years, the team must pay the player 144 percent of his previous salary, or an average of the top 5 salaries at the highest-paid position (likely QB), whichever is higher.

References

National Football League lists

Franchise tag


The yo-yo is a popular toy made with of a length of string tied at one end to a flat spool. It is used by holding the free end of the string (usually by inserting one finger in a slip knot) and pulling at it so as to cause the spool to turn while it is hanging in mid-air, either winding or unwinding the string.  It first became popular in the 1920s.

In the simplest play, the string is wound on the spool by hand. The yo-yo is then thrown downwards, so that it goes down and unwinds the string. It then (by inertia) climbs back, winding the string up. Finally the yo-yo is grabbed, ready to be thrown again. Many other trick plays exist, most based on the basic "sleeper" trick.
One of the most famous tricks on the yoyo is "walk the dog". This is done by throwing a strong sleeper and allowing the yoyo to roll across the floor.

English historical names for the yo-yo include bandalore (from French) and  quiz.  French historical terms include bandalore, incroyable, de Coblenz, emigrette, and joujou de Normandie (joujou meaning little toy).

History

The earliest surviving yo-yo dates to 500 BC and was made using terra cotta (clay) disks. A Greek vase painting from this date shows a boy playing yo-yo(see right). Greek records from this time describe toys made out of wood, metal, or painted terra cotta. The terra cotta disks were used to ceremonially offer the toys of youth to certain gods when a child came of age. Disks of other materials were used for actual play.

Philippine historical records show that 16th century hunters hiding in trees used a rock tied to a string up to 20 feet in length to throw at wild animals beneath them. The string meant they could get the rock back without having to come down from the tree.

References

Toys

Yo-yo


The chamail  is a type of poncho-like clothing from Central Asia.

As a result of Central-Asian influence, this type of clothing also appears in Indian works of art of the 1st millennium CE, as in Ajanta or Bagh. The chamail was probably introduced in India by the Sakas or the Kushans. The chamail also appears in Gandharan Buddhist sites such as Fondukistan and Bamiyan, and even as far as Xinjiang. In Kashmir also, the chamail appears on the Buddha or Bodhisattavas during the 6-7th century CE.

Examples

References

Sources

Dresses

Chamail (clothing)


Marianna Auenbrugger (19 July 1759 – 25 August 1782) was an Austrian pianist and composer.

Biography
Born in Vienna, Auenbrugger was the daughter of the physician Leopold Auenbrugger. She was a highly regarded pianist and composer in Vienna. Together with her sister Caterina Franziska, she was a student of Joseph Haydn and Antonio Salieri. In 1780, Haydn dedicated a cycle of six sonatas to the two sisters (Hob XVI :35-39 and 20).

When Marianne died in 1782, Salieri, at his own expense, published her Keyboard Sonata in E-flat together with his own funeral Ode De si piacevoli.

External links
 Melanie Unseld, "Auenbrugger, Katharina". In: Lexikon "Europäische Instrumentalistinnen des 18. und 19. Jahrhunderts", https://www.sophie-drinker-institut.de/auenbrugger-katharina.

1759 births
1782 deaths
18th-century Austrian musicians
18th-century Austrian women
18th-century Austrian women writers
18th-century Austrian writers
18th-century classical composers
18th-century keyboardists
Austrian classical composers
Austrian classical pianists
Austrian women composers
Austrian women pianists
Musicians from Vienna
Pupils of Antonio Salieri
Pupils of Joseph Haydn
Women classical pianists

Marianna Auenbrugger


A silver zinc battery is a secondary cell that utilizes silver(I,III) oxide and zinc.

Overview
Silver zinc cells share most of the characteristics of the silver-oxide battery, and in addition, is able to deliver one of the highest specific energies of all presently known electrochemical power sources. Long used in specialized applications, it is now being developed for more mainstream markets, for example, batteries in laptops and hearing aids.

Silver–zinc batteries, in particular, are being developed to power flexible electronic applications, where the reactants are integrated directly into flexible substrates, such as polymers or paper, using printing or chemical deposition methods.

Experimental new silver–zinc technology (different to silver-oxide) may provide up to 40% more run time than lithium-ion batteries and also features a water-based chemistry that is free from the thermal runaway and flammability problems that have plagued the lithium-ion alternatives.

Chemistry
The silver–zinc battery is manufactured in a fully discharged condition and has the opposite electrode composition, the cathode being of metallic silver, while the anode is a mixture of zinc oxide and pure zinc powders. The electrolyte used is a potassium hydroxide solution in water.

During the charging process, silver is first oxidized to silver(I) oxide
 2 Ag(s) + 2 OH− → Ag2O + H2O + 2 e−
and then to silver(II) oxide
 Ag2O + 2 OH− → 2 AgO + H2O + 2 e−,
while the zinc oxide is reduced to metallic zinc
 2 Zn(OH)2 + 4 e−  2 Zn + 4 OH−.
The process is continued until the cell potential reaches a level where the decomposition of the electrolyte is possible at about 1.55 volts. This is taken as the end of a charge, as no further charge is stored, and any oxygen that might be generated poses a mechanical and fire hazard to the cell.

History and usage
This technology had the highest energy density prior to lithium technologies. Primarily developed for aircraft, they have long been used in space launchers and crewed spacecraft, where their short cycle life is not a drawback. Non-rechargeable silver–zinc batteries powered the first Soviet Sputnik satellites, as well as US Saturn launch vehicles, the Apollo Lunar Module, lunar rover and life-support backpack.

The primary power sources for the Apollo command module (CM) were the hydrogen/oxygen fuel cells in the service module (SM). They provided greater energy densities than any conventional battery, but peak-power limitations required supplementation by silver–zinc batteries in the CM that also became its sole power supply during re-entry after separation of the service module. Only these batteries were recharged in flight.

After the Apollo 13 near-disaster, an auxiliary silver–zinc battery was added to the service module as a backup to the fuel cells. The Apollo service modules used as crew ferries to the Skylab space station were powered by three silver–zinc batteries between undocking and service module jettison, as the hydrogen and oxygen tanks could not store fuel-cell reactants through the long stays at the station.

These cells are found in applications for the military, for example in Mark 37 torpedoes and on Alfa-class submarines.

in the 1960s General Motors developed an electric car called Electrovair, which was powered by a zinc-silver battery produced by Eagle-Picher. However, the battery was expensive and lasted only a hundred charge-discharge cycles.

See also

 History of the battery
 Fuel cell
 Battery recycling
 List of battery types
 List of battery sizes
 Comparison of battery types
 Battery nomenclature

References

Disposable batteries
Metal oxide–zinc batteries

Silver zinc battery