Royal Navy frigate HMS Iron Duke set sail for the first time this year having spent the winter in her home port undergoing a sustained period of maintenance.
The Type 23 frigate, which spent the first half of 2016 on NATO duties in the Baltic and waters of northern Europe, is now headed for operational sea training – an exhaustive assessment of men, women and machine to ensure all are ready to perform front-line duties.
Before that, however, the Iron Ducks must be capable of performing the ‘billy basics’ of operating at sea: navigation, fire-fighting, rescuing an overboard sailor, coping with flooding, machinery breakdowns and calibrating sensors and weapon systems.
For the latter, that means flashing up all its guns from the 4.5in down to the automated 30mm cannon and the manual mini-guns for self-defence, sending tracer and live rounds into the English Channel in the South Coast Exercise areas.
In the ops room, the ship’s brain – the command system, which meshes all the data and information from the frigate’s sensors (the Artisan 3D radar on top of the main mast alone can track more than 800 potential targets simultaneously) – was tested against simulated threats.
And the flight deck has welcomed a Wildcat of 815 NAS at Yeovilton to begin regenerating aerial operations by day and night.
“The ship’s company are buzzing about being back at sea, conducting our usual business and building our operational capability,” said Iron Duke’s commanding officer Cdr Steve Banfield .
“This series of trials marks the start of the ship’s emergence from a long maintenance period in Portsmouth. The training is critical to achieve our demanding programme in 2017 – exercise and security operations around the UK throughout the year.”