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The Royal Navy’s most venerable warship, HMS Fearless,
returns to
Portsmouth
for the last time on Monday, March 18. She is ending her
career on a
high point
after taking part in one of the most notable deployments in
her 36-year history.
Fearless sailed on August 20 last year to take part in
Exercise Saif Sareea II – the Joint Service exercise in
Oman, held in conjunction with the Oman Armed Forces.
Although originally due home in December, Fearless was one
of four Royal Navy ships and seven Royal Fleet Auxiliary
vessels tasked to remain in Middle Eastern waters in
response to the tragic events of September 11. Troops from
40 Commando Royal Marines, and helicopters from 845 and 847
Naval Air Squadrons, were embarked.
The ship spent three weeks alongside in
Dubai
over Christmas and the New Year, her first visit to the
United Arab Emirates port since September 1967. The stop-over was essentially to
allow routine maintenance, but many of the ship’s company
took the opportunity to fly out their partners and families.
In the New Year Fearless undertook maritime interdiction
operations in the
Arabian Gulf
in support of United Nations Security Council resolutions.
Working alongside naval ships from the
USA,
Australia and
Canada, she monitored and boarded merchant vessels entering and
leaving
Iraq.
In early February the ship again embarked Royal Marines from
40 Commando before taking part in another amphibious
exercise, this time with UAE forces.
Exercise
Sea Dagger II provided the
UK with excellent training, and a further opportunity to
demonstrate continuing support for its allies in the Gulf.
For much of the time the ship also had seven helicopters
embarked – three Sea Kings, two Lynx and two Gazelles. After
the exercise, Fearless made a final visit to
Dubai to off-load the troops and their equipment before starting
the passage home in mid-February.
The longest serving of the Navy’s active warships, and its
last steam-powered vessel, HMS Fearless is older than most
of the 550 members of her ship’s company. The amphibious
assault ship that gained honours in the Falklands War and,
on a lighter note, was on hand to rescue James Bond (in the
film The Spy Who Loved Me), will be welcomed home by
more than 1,000 family members and friends of her ship’s
company.
It will be their chance, too, to say their farewells to a
ship whose distinctive lines have, for a period spanning
five decades, provided the Royal Navy with one of its most
enduring images. She will decommission at Portsmouth, so on
this occasion she will be wearing her paying-off pennant –
the 158-metre length of which reflects her many years of
service.
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