Meet the Royal Marines

Romon Francis and Natasha Hopkins climb the 8m high mobile climbing wall - the largest in the country

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Sport and Uniformed Public Services students were put through their paces by the Royal Marines at Hopwood Hall College last week. The special day was organised to provide an insight into life within the Royal Marines and involved some gruelling tasks.

A spectacular series of a series of demonstrations and activities were put on for the eager students; as you can imagine, the Marines don’t do things by half measures, and so some of the equipment they brought along was breath-taking – this included the biggest mobile climbing wall in the country, towering at over 8m high.

They also brought with them a selection of their current weapons systems, such as fully working (but without ammunition) machine guns, pistols and rifles, which the students got to have a go at ‘stripping down’ (taking apart for cleaning).

They also had a dressing-up session with a difference, trying on clothing such as artic warfare clothing.

Ration packs were on the menu. On these, Uniformed Public Services lecturer Steve McClusky commented that: “They taste much better than when I was in the Army.”

Female students, such as 16-year-old Natasha Hopkins, impressed the Marines, Capt Simon Dack MBE said: “The girls have been a credit to Hopwood Hall College during the physical session.”

Natasha and her fellow student Gemma Knight, 18, made history recently when they were the first ever female students to be invited to participate in a gruelling five-day ‘Life as a Royal Marine’ course at the Royal Marine Commando Training Centre at Lympstone, Devon last month.