One of the 193 Herald dead had just started his first job as a seafarer in the previous fortnight, a sailors’ chaplain now reveals.

Bill McCrea, now 76, had known the teenager when they were at the Merchant Navy and National Sea Training College in Gravesend in 1987.

He said: “A young fellow, who was 17, fell one night on his way over to the mission.

"They’d rush over to get to the phones first or on to the table tennis tables, and on his way over he tripped and split his forehead. We took him to hospital to get stitches.”

A few weeks later, the teenager died in the disaster – his first posting as a seafarer.

Mr McCrea, now a retired Sailors’ Society port chaplain, said: “He had only just finished his college course two weeks before and I knew him well.”

Mr McCrea conducted the boy’s funeral service, comforting his family as he, too, struggled to come to terms with the overall devastating loss.

“As much as I ministered to his family, they ministered to me, too.”

Just after the disaster, Mr McCrea took off to Dover and spent two weeks at the Seafarers’ Centre to support shocked and grieving families, practically and emotionally.

He said: “I’d dealt with many traumatic incidents in my role as a chaplain, but this sudden tragedy and the enormity of it put my pastoral ministry to the test.”

On the evening of March 6, 1987, he was on duty as chaplain at the Gravesend college.

He said: “I was with a number of the young trainees, as well as several crew members of the Herald who were at the college studying.

“When the men realised it was their ship they became deeply anxious.

"The only reason they weren’t on board was because they were at the college studying for their Efficient Deck Hand certificate.”

By the time the news came through that there was a massive death toll, Mr McCrea went straight to Dover.

He says: “It was an incredible shock to my system and I was very anxious.

"I have dealt with individual loss of life with seafarers’ families over the years, but it was the enormity of the situation. So many people lost their lives that night.

“Some of the families had to wait a long time for the recovery of their loved ones’ bodies.

“One woman, whose husband I buried, had to wait six weeks before they found his body.

"I gave her all the support I could during that time. Who can train you for that?

"The families were a great support to me. I was there to care for them but they reciprocated that, and as a result I got to know them really well.”

Mr McCrea officiated at four funeral services for the victims.

He said: “All the services I held were attended by crew who survived. It was part of their shared grief.”

He also supported passengers who had survived the sinking.

Mr McCrea said: “I met a woman on one of my hospital visits; she lost her husband that night.

"She told me the only reason she survived was that a truck driver helped keep her awake by pinching her.

"I’d dealt with many traumatic incidents in my role as a chaplain, but this sudden tragedy and the enormity of it put my pastoral ministry to the test” - Bill McCrea

“There were a lot of heroic acts that went on that night.”

After the tragedy, Mr McCrea would continue to visit family members he had supported in Dover for many years.

He even met crew members who had survived the disaster on ship visits years later.

On the first anniversary, Mr McCrea led a memorial service at the request of the families, starting a tradition that the Sailors’ Society has repeated every year since.

The 2017 service will be held at St Mary’s Church Dover, home of the main memorial to the victims of the tragedy and where Mr McCrea held one of the funeral services for the lost.

He said: “No one wants to be involved in this sort of tragedy and it was a big strain on me at the time, but supporting those I did is a great honour.”