HMS Victory, Admiral Lord Nelson's flagship at the Battle of Trafalgar in 1805, is in the midst of a 12 year refit which managers say is the second-largest heritage restoration project in Europe after Notre Dame Cathedral. The 45 million pound (53 million euro) works have already seen many of the ribs of the ship - known as futtocks - removed, due to water entering and causing rotting over the years and attracting deathwatch beetles. Visitors can still look round the ship at its dry dock in Portsmouth, UK, with project manager Simon Williams saying the chance to see Victory in its stripped-back state is "a once in a lifetime opportunity."
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00:00HMS Victory was made famous by her role as Admiral Lord Nelson's flagship at the Battle
00:07of Trafalgar in 1805. She survived that battle, it was obviously an overwhelming victory for
00:12the British fleet, but Lord Nelson did perish on board. She has been preserved ever since
00:19through luck, sometimes not so much judgement, and therefore she's with us today. It was
00:25discovered through shipwright surveys that the ship was degrading, water was getting
00:29into the structure, it was allowing rot to grow and develop, and then as the timber degraded
00:35it became food for death watch beetle, and then over time that has just been eroding
00:40the structure of the ship. And so we've embarked on this project to essentially remove the
00:46external rotten timber, dry out the structure, and then we will replank and ensure that we
00:53stop water ingressing in future. We're at the stage of the project now where we've removed
00:57a lot of the planking from the outside of the ship, which was rotten and allowing water
01:02in, and we've uncovered a lot of damaged frames. So the next stage of the project is to work
01:10away fore-to-aft, removing the damaged frames, carrying out repairs where possible, and we'll
01:15be using oak planking and traditional methods to reinstate the ship to how she was during
01:21the Battle of Trafalgar.
01:27When we were removing the planking we were coming across tools, notes, history. It's
01:33quite fun from the previous work done across the last 100, 150 years really. The size of
01:38the timber we're working with is, it's fun, it's interesting, it adds another level of
01:44complexity to it. It's definitely a great honour to work here.
01:48We are currently looking at a 12-year programme. This much structure has not been removed from
01:55the ship and replaced since 1814. This conservation project is the largest conservation project
02:02in Europe after Notre Dame. I think what we're doing here massively adds to the visitor experience
02:08because I think it's such a unique visual experience. They will not see this in their
02:14lifetime again. Seeing the underlying structure of victory and seeing this scale of work is
02:18a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.
02:22We think there's probably about 7-14% of the ship dates to the time of Nelson. What I think
02:28is really important to stress is that the ship is made of timber. Throughout her active
02:35service life she would have been repaired, refitted, elements changed, but the more we
02:43conserve the more our visitors can be assured that they're walking in the footsteps of those
02:4819th century sailors.