Radio Club comes to Mariners' Park

A Merseyside society for former radio officers has found a new home at the Nautilus retirement estate Mariners' Park.

The club meets every Friday morning in the Trinity House Hub building, and members transmit to amateur radio enthusiasts around the UK and beyond.

The equipment they use is similar to the devices they used onboard every day for work until the radio officer role was phased out in the 1980s. The club has its own call sign, and members can transmit and receive using Morse Code as well as by voice.

Some of the retired radio officers who now meet at Mariners' Park have been members of the club since it was founded by Stan McNally and friends over a decade ago as the Marine Radio Museum Society (Wirral). The call sign at that time was GB2PLY, and the society transmitted from the historic warship HMS Plymouth.

Despite HMS Plymouth's significance as the vessel on which the Argentinians had signed their surrender at the end of the Falklands War, the warship was sent to scrap in 2014 and the club had to find a new location.

This home was offered at Fort Perch Rock in New Brighton, a coastal building where club members were able to set up a museum that included a well-regarded Titanic exhibition. The call sign at Fort Perch Rock was G4FPR.

'We had three marine radio stations of the 1950s and 1960s era installed in the radio tower,' remembers club member Clive Evans. 'In the memory room we had a chart marking positions of all Allied ships sunk during the Second World War.'

When the owners of Fort Perch Rock eventually took the site back for a different use, some of the museum exhibits had to be given away, but the radio club continued in the Liverpool docks onboard the historic lightship Planet and then the tug France Hayhurst (both with call sign MOLBL).

The France Hayhurst sank in 2023, so the club had to be suspended for a while, but Stan McNally would not accept defeat. Now a resident of Mariners' Park, he started campaigning for a radio station at the Park, donating £1,000 to get the project off the ground.

On 20 September 2024, Stan saw his dream realised with the grand opening of the radio room in the Trinity House Hub. The call sign is still MOLBL, and the club now has a secure future on the Wirral, where it all started.

• If you live in the Merseyside area and would be interested in joining the Mariners' Park Radio Club's Friday meetings, please email welfare@nautilusint.org for more information

Planning your nautical retirement?

Mariners' Park supports retired and needy seafarers and their dependants who are aged over 55. The park offers a full range of independent living properties; a bespoke supportive living accommodation building for those with care needs; and a 36-bed care home that provides 24/7 care, nursing, dementia and palliative support. 

Accommodation is available now for those maritime professionals that have served in the Merchant Navy across all sectors, including maritime pilots and crew on large yachts, as well as those who have served in the Royal Navy or on deep sea fishing trawlers.

Arrange a visit to Mariners' Park in Wallasey, UK, to talk about the retirement options or register to have your name added to the accommodation list, by emailing welfare@nautilusint.org or calling +44(0)151 346 8840. There is more information at www.nautiluswelfarefund.org

Visit the Nautilus Welfare Fund