HMS Cardiff (D108)
HMS Cardiff was a British Type 42 destroyer and the third ship of the Royal Navy to be named in honour of the Welsh capital city of Cardiff.
For other ships with the same name, see HMS Cardiff.
Cardiff served in the Falklands War, where she was involved in the 1982 British Army Gazelle friendly fire incident. She also shot down the last Argentine aircraft of the conflict and accepted the surrender of a 700-strong garrison in the settlement of Port Howard.
During the 1991 Gulf War, her Lynx helicopter sank two Iraqi minesweepers. She later participated in the build-up to the 2003 invasion of Iraq as part of the Royal Navy's constant Armilla patrol, but was not involved in the actual invasion.
Cardiff was decommissioned in July 2005, and sent for scrapping despite calls by former servicemen for her to be preserved as a museum ship and local tourist attraction in Cardiff.
Construction[edit]
The Type 42 destroyers (also known as the Sheffield class) were made in three batches;[6] Cardiff was built in the first. She cost over £30 million, which was double her original quoted price.[7] Her keel was laid down on 6 November 1972, at Vickers Shipbuilding and Engineering Ltd in Barrow-in-Furness, Cumbria. The build was interrupted by a labour shortage at Vickers. To solve this problem, she was towed to Swan Hunter's Hawthorn Leslie yard in Hebburn, Tyne and Wear and completed there.[8]
Type 42s were designed as anti-aircraft vessels primarily equipped with the Sea Dart, a surface-to-air missile system capable of hitting targets up to 56 kilometres (30 nmi) away.[9] Cardiff's secondary weapon system was a 4.5 inch Mark 8 naval gun, capable of firing 21-kilogram (46 lb) shells to a range of 22 kilometres (12 nmi).[10] After the Falklands War, in which two Type 42s were sunk by enemy aircraft, the entire class was equipped with the Phalanx close-in weapon system,[11] a Gatling cannon that could fire 3,000 rounds per minute and was designed to shoot down anti-ship missiles.[12]
Operational history[edit]
Early career[edit]
Cardiff was launched on 22 February 1974 by Lady Caroline Gilmour.[13] Following fitting-out and sea trials, Cardiff commissioned on 24 September 1979 under command of Captain Barry Wilson.[14] During the next 12 months of active service she steamed over 21,000 kilometres (13,000 mi) and undertook various duties. She returned to her place of construction, Tyne and Wear, so that the Swan Hunter crew who fitted her out could exhibit the warship to their families. In the spirit of establishing a firm association, Cardiff visited her namesake city and welcomed more than 7,000 people on board. Her crew raised over £1,000 for local charities by participating in sponsored bicycle rides and dinghy rows from Portsmouth and Newcastle upon Tyne. BBC Radio Wales based an entire programme on her and she appeared on the BBC and ITV national television channels. In November 1979, Cardiff coordinated the search for survivors of the MV Pool Fisher, which sank off the Isle of Wight with the loss of most of her crew.[14]
In 1980, she attended the annual Navy Days event at Portsmouth and Portland Harbour, receiving a total of 17,300 visitors. In October of the same year, she ventured abroad for the first time on a visit to Ghent, Belgium. She followed this with a fortnight of Sea Dart exercises on a range off Aberporth, in South Wales. Whilst in the region, the destroyer attended celebrations marking the 75th anniversary of Cardiff's city status.[14]
Falklands War (1982)[edit]
On 2 April 1982, the disputed British overseas territory of the Falkland Islands was invaded by neighbouring Argentina.[15] The United Kingdom, nearly 13,000 kilometres (8,000 mi) away, assembled and dispatched a naval task force of 28,000 troops to recapture the islands.[15][16] The conflict ended that June with the surrender of the Argentine forces; the battles fought on land, at sea, and in the air had cost the lives of some 900 British and Argentine servicemen.[15]
Just over a month before the start of the war, Cardiff, under the command of Captain Michael Harris,[17] had begun a six-month deployment to the Persian Gulf with the Armilla Patrol. Cardiff had relieved her sister ship and class lead Sheffield from this operational tasking,[18] but was herself redeployed to the Falklands effort on 23 April. She sailed alone to Gibraltar[18] and rendezvoused on 14 May with the Bristol group of British warships already heading south to the islands.[19]
During the journey, Cardiff's crew performed various training exercises, including defence against air attack (involving simulation runs by friendly Harrier and Jaguar aircraft), nuclear, biological, and chemical weapons and Exocet anti-ship missiles.[20] All British Type 42's involved in the war were instructed to paint two vertical black stripes down either side the middle of their ships. This would allow the Royal Navy submarines to distinguish them from the two Argentine Type 42's.[21] On 22 May, an Argentine reconnaissance Boeing 707, no. TC-92 of the Argentine Air Force's Grupo 1, De Transporte Aereo Escuadron II (Spanish for "2nd Air Transport Squadron, Group 1"), was fired on by Cardiff.[22] The aircraft was detected while shadowing the Bristol group, and Cardiff was ordered to drop back and engage.[22][23] The ship fired two Sea Darts at the aircraft at 11:40 (local time) from maximum range; the first fell short and second missed[22] due to evasive manoeuvres taken by the aircraft's crew.[24] After the attack, TC-92 dropped below radar level and returned to El Palomar.[24] On 25 May, Cardiff was tasked with the recovery of four Special Air Service (SAS) troopers, who had parachuted from a C-130 Hercules passing over the destroyer.[20]