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HMS Queen Elizabeth sets sail for first time: 'Big Lizzie' squeezes under Forth Road Bridge

HMS Elizabeth, the largest and most powerful ship ever built for the Royal Navy, has set sail for the very first time.

‘Big Lizzie’, as the ship is affectionately known, was delicately guided out of the Rosyth basin in Fife, where she was assembled, by navigators, pilots and tug boats in a three-hour operation.

At high tide, the ship was taken through a narrow gate avoiding the dock walls by inches while under the water line there was just half a metre between the bottom of the ship and the seabed.

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Once travelling just a few hundred metres in the Forth, the carrier dropped anchor in order to wait for the tide to lower, allowing space to pass under the Firth’s famous bridges.

The £3 billion behemoth, which is set to be the nation’s future flagship, and her 700-strong ship’s company are heading to the North Sea for maiden sea trials over the summer.

A total of 10,000 people worked on construction of the ship, made up in sections at yards around the UK and transported to Rosyth, where it was assembled.