Admiral General Chief of Staff of the Navy, Antonio Martorell Lacave, has died this Friday in Madrid at the age of 62, as reported by Defense. He held this position since February 2021.
“It is a very sad day for the Ministry of Defense, for the Navy and for all the Armed Forces,” the department said in a statement collected by the Europa Press agency. Minister Margarita Robles has already conveyed her condolences to her relatives and those close to her.
Born in Bilbao in 1960, he entered the MarÃn Military Naval School in 1979 and received his office as second lieutenant in 1984. Throughout his career he has been on board frigates, corvettes, minesweepers and mine hunters.
Among his destinations on land, he was a professor at the Escuela Superior de las Fuerzas Armadas, head of the Torpedo Workshop of the Arsenal of Cartagena, has been assigned three times to the General Staff of the Navy, head of the European Union Area of ​​the General Directorate of Defense Policy and head of the Exercise Section at the NATO Joint Headquarters in Naples.
Martorell was a graduate of the General Staff, a specialist in Submarine Weapons and completed, among others, the Advanced Tactics officer courses and Communications aptitude. He also took various courses abroad.
Among other responsibilities, in 2014 he was promoted to rear admiral and appointed chief of the Logistics Division of the Navy General Staff and, in 2015, he was appointed Commander of Naval Action Group 2.
In 2017 he was appointed admiral of Naval Action and Comspmarfor and on June 23 of that year he was promoted to vice admiral. Between March and October 2019, he was also the commander of the European Union’s Operation Atalanta. After that he was appointed commander of the High Availability Maritime Headquarters.
On May 19, 2020, he was promoted to admiral and appointed Fleet Admiral. Since 2021 he held the position of Chief of Staff of the Navy (Ajema) replacing Admiral Teodoro López Calderón.
In addition, he has the Grand Cross of Naval Merit and of the Royal and Military Order of San Hermenegildo and twelve other national and foreign military decorations.
