Type 45 destroyer is put through its paces
Rigorous tests have been applied to a Portsmouth-based Type 45 destroyer as she is declared ready for front-line duty.
HMS Dauntless has been put through her paces in an intensive nine months of maintenance, trials and training regimes. She was cleared for operations after a gruelling assessmentofhercrew,allweapons and systems.
Her regeneration – which included three months of trials around the UK to test her enhanced engines last summer–meanssheisnowreadyto be deploy on global operations laterthisyear.CommanderBen Power, Commanding Officer of HMS Dauntless, said: ‘I am immensely proud of what the ship’s company have achieved, to be able to take a ship with a new and unproven propulsion plantandturnitintoacredible air defence destroyer ready for global operations in a period of just nine months is an enormous achievement.’
HMS Dauntless’s training was completed in only four months off the south coast – including the testing of all of its weapons. This included her ferocious 30mm cannons, the 4.5in main gun and Phalanx radar-controlled gun.
The latter is capable of spitting out four-and-a-half thousand rounds per minute at incomingaircraft,missilesand fast-attack boats. General purpose and heavy machine guns were also tested to the brink.
Testingalsoincludedtrackingtargetswithaverylowradar crosssection,designedtoreplicate a small incoming missile – a crucial part of the air defence destroyer’s capability. The destroyer’s multi-function radar on the main mast and long range radar on the rear mast proved their capabilities of tracking targets flying at altitudes or across the waves.
A five-week testing regime wasalsogiventotheship’scompany at Devonport Naval Base.
The training increased in complexity with other vessels and helicopters added to the equation as the ship defeated threats simulated by aircraft and boats in a range of environments, including in the air, onthesurfaceandevenunderwater.
HMS Dauntless showed it was able to perform well in a disaster relief and crises response role.
She carried out a ‘rescue’ from a stricken merchant vessel and provided engineering support following an incident at sea, before an evacuation operation in which the ship brought people escaping conflict to safety - providing food, water and medical care.