Das Aufentern in die Takelage ist eine heikle Sache, erst recht bei Wind und Welle. Ein schwerer Unfall Ende 2010 vor Patagonien hätte beinahe das Ende für die Gorch Fock bedeutet. Damals war der Kadettin Sarah Seele, Stunden zuvor erst aus Deutschland eingeflogen und bar jeder Ahnung, befohlen worden, siebenmal aufzusteigen.
Beim siebten Mal rutschte sie ab und stürzte in die Tiefe. Die Marine-Führung bagatellisierte die Sache, ihre selbstgefälligen Berichte sorgten für weitere Empörung; Alkoholexzesse, Schrullen des Kommandanten und seltsame Späße der Besatzung, etwa die Sammlung aufgereihter Damenwäsche im Maschinenraum. Das sollte Deutschlands Gorch Fock sein?
Ein früherer Kommandant, Hans Freiherr von Stackelberg, fasste damals die Marine-Philosophie so zusammen: Es gehe auf dem Schiff darum, beim Marinenachwuchs „Spreu von Weizen in unmissverständlicher Weise zu trennen“, was allerdings in „einer ausgeprägten Wohlstandsgesellschaft“ Konfliktpotential liefere und dann, so Stackelberg, „bei tragischen und stets zu beklagenden Unglücksfällen bisweilen in besonders unerfreulicher Form zum Ausdruck kommt“. Es fiel damals nicht ganz leicht, dem Schiff die Treue zu halten.
Heutzutage wird niemand mehr zum Aufstieg in die Rahen gezwungen. Und hoch oben wird zügig, aber ohne Druck gearbeitet, bis der Letzte fertig ist. Was nach Waldorfschule klingt, ist für die Besatzung eine Überlebensversicherung. Viele an Bord sind sich sicher: Eine neue Debatte über Unfälle könnte das Aus bedeuten. Niemand darf mehr abrutschen, auch nicht Kapitänleutnant Hoffschlag, die noch immer in 25 Meter Höhe balanciert.
Kein Offizier vergisst seine Zeit an Bord
Auf der Gorch Fock lernen angehende Offiziere das seemännische Handwerk. Mitgeliefert werden Kameradschaft, Anpassungsfähigkeit, Körperbeherrschung, Charakterbildung. Niemand verlässt das Schiff nach sechs Wochen Ausbildungstörn als der- oder dieselbe. Und kein Offizier der Marine vergisst seine Zeit an Bord, dafür ist das Erlebnis zu eindringlich.
Die 1958 gebaute Bark kann als Starkwindsegler Orkanen trotzen, Wellen von acht, neun Metern gelten für die Erfahreneren als unproblematisch. Die Kadetten lernen dabei, das Fürchten zu überwinden. Burkhart Kempcke, 61 Jahre alt und seit bald vierzig Jahren als Steward an Bord, weiß aber auch von 20-Meter-Brechern zu berichten – und den Schwierigkeiten, die das fürs Tischdecken in der Offiziersmesse mit sich bringt.
The commander on board is frigate captain Elmar Bornkessel. The 48-year-old officer took over the Gorch Fock just a few days ago. Previously, the North Hesse native commanded the Navy’s most modern warships, and most recently he was in Brussels with NATO.
Bornkessel is one of the few active officers who has leadership experience on the Gorch Fock. He has already spent years on board, first as a young sailing officer, then for two years as first officer. And so he was not entirely surprised when the Inspector of the Navy, Vice Admiral Jan Kaack, told him in Brussels a few months ago that he wanted to entrust him with the Gorch Fock. And he is also pleased that Sven Erkelenz, an experienced comrade from back then, is now sailing with him as “EinsO”, i.e. first officer.
A lifelong dream, no doubt about it. But also a command with months of sea voyages, which come at a price when you are the father of growing children. Bornkessel’s predecessor, Captain Andreas-Peter Graf von Kielmansegg, has led the ship for the past three years. He studied the procedures on the Gorch Fock thoroughly and wrote an internal manual, the “Blue Kielmansegg”. On July 25, he handed over command and is now on land in a naval authority. The fate of the Bundeswehr.
“Command and obedience remain the basic framework”
Steffen Kreidl has escaped this. The ship’s sergeant has been sailing on the Gorch Fock almost continuously since 1995. Kreidl is on board what the “sergeant” is on land, the “mother of the company”. Born in Hesse and a passionate fly fisherman, he is a unique individual. No one knows the ship better than him, no one has a keener eye for the strengths and weaknesses of the crew.
As soon as you are on board and have questions, you are told: “Go to Kreidl.” It is easy to find him because Kreidl wears thick, black-rimmed glasses and the collar of his overalls is usually turned up. And he is everywhere at once. An individualist in uniform who says that today’s cadets have different ideas about life at sea than previous generations, “but orders and obedience remain the basic framework of soldierly cooperation.” Nothing has changed in this regard.
When the 80 or so cadets from the naval school come on board, all of the regular crew members are their teachers. They need to develop their physical and technical understanding, read wind, waves and air pressure, develop their seamanship skills and become a “sighted man,” as Kreidl says.
He is happy to see how new generations come on board, who initially know nothing, and how he then experiences how “the leadership recedes as skills develop”. Then the cadets gradually take on responsibility and know what to do. A well-rehearsed team is formed that can survive any windjammer regatta on the Gorch Fock.
The barque is not only a storm-proof sailing training ship, but also a multiple award-winning competitor, for example in the race for the legendary “Boston Teapot” trophy, which it won three times in a row in the 1960s.
The Gorch Fock’s crew consists of a hundred officers, non-commissioned officers and junior sailors. As ship’s technicians, they are responsible for the engine room, as ship’s doctor they provide medical and sometimes mental first aid, or, like Rostock’s quartermaster Kristian Sühr, are responsible for the food. While the cadets, i.e. the officer candidates, only come on board for an intensive six-week trip, the regular crew is always there. Like Lieutenant Commander Alice Hoffschlag, who has been part of the crew for three years.
Rah, Tampen, Toppgast: There are 350 special terms
Hoffschlag casts off the ropes on the yard that hold one of the five sails on the mainmast alone. Many things on the Gorch Fock have strange names from times long past. In this case, it is the main topsail, not to be confused with the main topgallant sail directly above it or the fore topsail on the first of the three masts.
Each sail is as big as a three-room apartment and made of heavy cloth. The men and women who work up here all the time are called top-men, which is easy to remember. There are also about three hundred and fifty other special terms, and it can be said that even medical students learn things by heart in anatomy that they rarely need later. It’s about the principle.
Some, says ship’s sergeant Kreidl, “look into it like a pig looks into a clockwork.” But it’s actually not that difficult: “For example, we have ten square sails; if you understand one, you’ve understood all ten.” Some terms are funny. A boatswain, for example, who keeps order on deck, always wears the “guard egg.” But this is not the fragile gift of a chicken, but a large, shiny, golden, egg-shaped pin.
Just now, First Officer Erkelenz called out melodiously across the deck, almost singing what was going on: “Lower the ropes to the sail, sheets to port.” The regular crew knows what to do. Captain Bornkessel wants to see the ship sail. A few meters away from Lieutenant Hoffschlag, Corporal Maximilian S. is struggling with a knot that isn’t coming undone so quickly.
Sails can only be set together
A total of three dozen men and women climbed over the shrouds to untie some of the sails. Normally, this is mainly a job for the cadets. But they won’t be back on board for a few months. So the regular crew will be sailing to Stettin.
The 20-year-old Corporal Maximilian S. enjoys seafaring and the ship, but after about a year and a half he wants to study political science first, partly because he doesn’t particularly appreciate the command-and-obedience system on board, as one quickly notices when the boatswains energetically distribute tasks. In order to set the heavy sails, a dozen men and women now have to literally pull together. “Hoool!” one calls out in a drawn-out voice, “Away!!!” 15 answer and move the sails into position meter by meter. They can only do it together.
Stackelberg, the commander in the 1970s, wrote that the training of cadets had an “ideal influence on the often self-centered individualist.” The sea shapes character. Here at Cape Arkona, in glorious summer weather, you can only guess at that. But next week it could be completely different, stormy with high seas. Kreidl says: “It’s about getting the young people to a calculable performance limit.” He still thinks it’s a great task.
This also means living together in a very small space for months. Hammocks are strung up on a low tween deck, and dozens of sailors sleep there, close together, for weeks and months. Many an experienced sailor, who has long lived in a two-person cabin, still wishes he had his hammock back when it is stormy for days and the sea gets rougher. The advantage: you can sleep comfortably in the hammocks and don’t get seasick.
Kreidl says that the ship gives the future leadership a “glimpse into a subordinate existence, enables empathy for the lower decks in the future.” But he also says: “Living in the division, climbing up and cleaning the toilets does not provide any knowledge that will later enable you to become an inspector.”
The British junior officers sail on small, beefy boats
Some nations, such as the British, train their junior officers without sailing training ships. Great Britain sends the aspiring officers out in groups of 16 men on small “Sea Class 15” training boats with modern technology. On training trips to the Baltics, for example, the small groups learn to organize and lead a Royal Navy warship independently. When the bulky, small boats enter foreign ports, however, one thinks more of hippos than of Britain’s greatness.
The Gorch Fock, on the other hand, is not only a training platform but also a flagship and, at best, an “ambassador” for the Federal Republic. Since her first trip, she has also visited countries that had previously learned to fear Germany through gunboat politics or worse. New York, London and Bordeaux were early destinations.
In 1988, she was the first ship of the German Navy to visit the Israeli port city of Haifa, where she impressed people with her “tact and modesty,” as a contemporary report put it. The “white ambassador” also became popular because she had adorned the Bundesbank’s ten-mark note since 1963. The Gorch Fock was a symbol of a new, changed Germany, in which many people liked to see their reflection. This is still true today.
This trip to Poland is also a political mission. German-Polish relations were difficult for a few years, but things are now improving again. And that is why the invitation from Stettin to come to the big Baltic Sea meeting of windjammers was gladly accepted, says Captain Bornkessel. It is a bit difficult through the narrow Oder water behind the lagoon. A Polish pilot comes on board, that is mandatory here. As the Gorch Fock enters Stettin, hundreds wave to her and she is given the parade ground, directly under the voivodeship building on the promenade.
The material on the Gorch Fock sometimes seems cheap
Wherever the Gorch Fock arrives, it becomes the venue for festive meals. In Stettin, a high-ranking NATO ambassador, a three-star general and the city’s political leaders are expected on board in the evening. The commander then has to transform himself into the perfect host, and in the galley, where around 600 meals are prepared every day, the menu is switched to Michelin-star cuisine. Captain Bornkessel then receives guests in his rooms, which have been somewhat simplified during the almost six years the ship has been in the shipyard.
At that time, the costs had risen to an astronomical 135 million euros, partly due to botched work and fraud. In the end, the ship was renovated quickly and economically by the Lürssen shipyard in Bremen. For example, the beautiful, carefully removed wooden furnishings in the officers’ mess were left behind, destroyed by incorrect storage at the Elsfleth shipyard. If you look closely, you will notice that some of the materials in the ship are cheap and the workmanship is poor. A loss of substance, despite all the joy that the Gorch Fock is sailing again.
In Stettin, after three days at sea, the ship and crew slip into holiday and shore leave mode. All the brass was polished during the day, as were the ship’s bells. Kempcke has set the table, everything is in a row ready for the guests. In a week, the Gorch Fock will go back to the shipyard for a routine inspection, they say hopefully. And then the new cadets will come on board, and Captain Bornkessel’s first major training cruise will begin. In 2026, he plans to head for New York and other American ports with the Gorch Fock.
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