Navy EOD

History

The Navy has cleared bombs, mines and other ordnance from British beaches, harbours and inshore waters since the Second World War, and from the 1970s the work has been organised around regional clearance-diving units. The units respond to roughly a hundred callouts a year between them, dealing with everything from wartime sea mines and torpedoes to grenades and improvised devices reported by the Coastguard, fishermen or the public. In 2022 the diving groups were reorganised into the Diving & Threat Exploitation Group. The vehicles are described as having previously been finished in the Navy's dark blue. It carries an illuminated BOMB DISPOSAL sign between blue beacons, blue-and-yellow chequered ('Battenburg') side markings over white, a full-length roof gantry, a mesh-guarded windscreen, a winch and a front skid plate.