The new HMCS Protecteur was launched Dec. 13 but the Royal Canadian Navy public affairs did its best to ingore the event. (Seaspan photo).

By Newell Durnbrooke

It’s not every day a new ship is launched for the Royal Canadian Navy.

So when the new HMCS Protecteur supply/replenish/joint support ship was launched on Friday, December 13, 2024 you would think it would be a big deal. After all, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and RCN commander Vice Adm. Angus Topshee attended the event.

But it was pretty much radio silence out of Canadian Forces/DND and RCN public affairs branches. There was no news release sent out to journalists. There was no backgrounder outlining the capabilities of the new vessel sent out or put online for journalists/the public, as has been the case previously. No photos were proactively sent to reporters. No journalists were contacted to conduct interviews with senior RCN personnel about the new ship.

Now Seaspan directly contacted journalists and proactively provided them with photos and information.

But the official public affairs branch of the Canadian Armed Forces, with its hundreds of public affairs officers, was a no show when it came to what is known as the mainstream news media (ie, print, radio and TV) as well as any information on its public website. Go to the main DND/CAF page and you will page news releases about Bill Blair, etc. but nothing on the new ship.

Instead, the RCN publicity was focused on Facebook and X (formerly Twitter). On late Friday, Dec. 13 it posted a photo of the new ship on Facebook. On X, it had a tweet the day before and a tweet of the day of the launch, with some photos. Maybe that is the way to go for publicity these days…who knows.

Despite the lack of RCN/CAF outreach, journalists did show up for the event.

The speeches were covered live on the Cable Public Affairs Channel (CPAC) since the prime minister was involved.

The Canadian Press news wire service, produced an article that was carried in many newspapers. TV crews, again those invited by Seaspan’s initiative, showed up and that resulted in some coverage.

The irony of course is that senior Canadian Armed Forces officers continuously complain about the lack of positive news coverage from mainstream news outlets….yet they don’t lift a finger to promote a positive news story when they have one.