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File:HMS Cardiff.jpeg
History
UK
Name	HMS Cardiff
Operator	Royal Navy
Builder	Vickers
Laid down	6 November 1972
Launched	22 February 1974
Commissioned	24 September 1979
Decommissioned	14 July 2005
Motto	Acris in cardine rerum
Fate	Awaiting disposal
General characteristics
Class and type	Type 42 destroyer
Displacement	4,820 tonnes
Length	125 m (410 ft)
Beam	14.3 m (47 ft)
Draught	5.8 m (19 ft)
Propulsion	list error: <br /> list (help) COGOG (Combined Gas or Gas) turbines, 2 shafts 2 turbines producing 36 MW
Speed	30 knots (56 km/h)
Complement	287-301
Armament	list error: <br /> list (help) 2 × Sea Dart Surface-to-air missile launchers 1 × 4.5 inch (114 mm) Mk.8 gun 2 × 20 mm Oerlikon guns 2 × Phalanx Close-in weapon system 2 × triple anti-submarine torpedo tubes NATO Seagnat and DLF3 decoy launchers
Aircraft carried	Lynx HAS3

The third and present HMS Cardiff (D108) is a Type 42 (Batch 1) destroyer of the Royal Navy.

Cardiff was built by Vickers Shipbuilding and Engineering, launched in 1974 by Lady Caroline Gilmore and commissioned in 1979. When decommissioned, she was one of the last ships in the Royal Navy to have been involved in the Falklands War.

HMS Cardiff at War in 1982

In 1982 HMS Cardiff was under the command of Captain M. G. T. Harris. On the 11th May 1982 Cardiff sailed from Gibraltar and headed south with the 'Bristol Group', including ships: HMS Bristol (senior officer) HMS Minerva, HMS Penelope, HMS Andromeda, HMS Active, HMS Avenger and RFA Olna, RFA Bayleaf, RFA Fort Grange. The afternoon of the 22 May 1982 was to be the first encounter with the enemy. The group was four days sailing from the Falkland Islands when electronic warfare operators in the ships were alerted to the presence of an Argentine Air Force Boeing 707.

This aircraft was well known to the British and had been named the 'Burglar'. Although a basic passenger/transport aircraft the Argentines used the long range Boeing 707 as a reconnaissance asset. It had very limited capabilities in this role, using a very basic radar set to detect surface contacts ahead and close them to get visual identification (mark I eyeball technology). The group was

ordered to action stations and soon after Cardiff detected the hostile aircraft on radar, 'locking up' with her type 909 fire control radars at a range in excess of forty nautical miles. When the target became 'feasible' Cardiff requested permission to open fire with her Sea Dart from Bristol. Permission was denied and the aircraft skirted around the force unmolested - Cardiff fell back from the rest of the group, waiting in ambush. Eventually the 'Burglar' did turn back in towards the group and tentatively closed. Cardiff fired two Sea Dart missiles at extreme range and as she did so the Boeing 707 turned sharply away and made an almost suicidal dive for the sea. One missile was seen on radar to explode three or four miles short and the other appeared to merge. However, due to the skill of aircrew, Vicecomodoro O. Ritondale, Vicecomodoro W.D. Barbero and a very vigilant, responsive crew the aircraft made it back home with only some strange oil like deposits on the rear fuselage for their troubles. The crew would not have been so fortunate had Captain A Grose in Bristol not been so hesitant. It would have been a classic Sea Dart 'down-the-throat' shot and first kill for Cardiff.

Cardiff arrived in the Total Exclusion Zone on the 26 May 1982 and was immediately allocated a station, with sister ship HMS Exeter on picket duty for the carriers. This entailed being down threat and essentially the first line of detection and defence for the Task Force. In the hours of darkness she was deployed close inshore for Naval Gunfire Support (NGS) or positioned to use her anti air warfare radars and weapon fit to deter Argentine night flying operations. On the 14 June 1982 during one of these clandestine night operations she shot out of the sky an Argentine Canberra bomber (B-108) of grupo2 Fuerza Aérea Argentina with her Sea Dart missile system firing a single missile. The time was 01:30AM (GMT)and the missile travelled just beyond thirty nautical miles before impacting with B-108. The navigator of the stricken bomber, Capitán Fernando Juan Casado, Fuerza Aérea Argentina is thought to have been killed instantly. However, the pilot, Capitán Roberto Pastrán, Fuerza Aérea Argentina ejected and was taken prisoner. Canberra B-108 was one of four aircraft in a formation known as 'BACO section' - two Canberra with two escorting Mirage fighters.

Cardiff would have success and tragedy with Sea Dart. Success with shooting down Canberra B-108. Tragedy in the form of a British Army Gazelle helicopter downed 6 June 1982. On 5 June 1982 Cardiff was detached from the task force in company with HMS Yarmouth tasked with providing Naval Gunfire Support (NGS) in support of troops ashore, arriving on the 'Gunline' at around 03:00am the following morning. Also, Cardiff would attempt to intercept Argentine C130 Hercules flights that were sneaking past the British blockade almost nightly. Whilst on station carrying out her assignment an unidentified air contact suddenly appeared on the screens of the radar operators in Cardiff's operations room. All four personnel onboard were killed when Cardiff engaged it at a range of eleven nautical miles with Sea Dart. This contact turned out to be a British Army Air Corps Gazelle helicopter from 656 Squadron, piloted by S/Sgt. Christopher A Griffin. The wreckage of the aircraft was later found two miles South of Mount Pleasant Peak. This tragic accident was the only fatal blue-on-blue surface to air incident of the Falklands War

Within days of the Argentine surrender HMS Cardiff took possession and crewed the Argentine Coast Guard patrol boat CG82 Islas Malvinas and renamed it HMS Tiger Bay. Her first Royal Navy commanding officer was Lieutenant Christopher Waters R.N. (Deceased). The Argentines had deployed two of these Z Class patrol boats around the islands, the other being GC83 Río Iguazú. On the 1 May 1982 the Islas Malvinas was attacked when a Lynx helicopter from HMS Alacrity, tasked with Naval Gunfire Support spotting, came across the little patrol boat and attacked her with machine gun fire. Because the Lynx was required to carry a passenger (Captain Christopher Brown, 148 Commando Forward Observation Unit, Royal Artillery) the Sea Skua anti ship missile was not fitted in a bid to reduce weight, therefore increasing the endurance of the aircraft. Both the Lynx and Islas Malvinas were hit in an exchange of small arms fire and one crewman onboard Islas Malvinas injured.

HMS Tiger Bay remained in Royal Navy service well after the war had finished and was eventually returned to Portsmouth in 1985.

Cardiff made it through the conflict unscathed and returned home in company with HMS Exeter and HMS Yarmouth Two of her sister-ships - Sheffield and Coventry - were sunk (and Glasgow damaged).

Notes

1. Sandy Woodward (2003). One Hundred Days: The Memoirs of the Falklands Battle Group Commander p.142. HarperCollins. ISBN 0-0071-3467-3.
2. Fuerza Aérea Argentina - Technical material
3. Exequiel Martínez, Argentine military aviator and SAR helicopter pilot in 1982.
4. Sandy Woodward (2003). One Hundred Days: The Memoirs of the Falklands Battle Group Commander p.469. HarperCollins. ISBN 0-0071-3467-3.
5. Fuerza Aérea Argentina - Mission details.
6. HMS Yarmouth, Captain's diary
7. Sandy Woodward (2003). One Hundred Days: The Memoirs of the Falklands Battle Group Commander p.445. HarperCollins. ISBN 0-0071-3467-3.
8. Middlebrook, The Argentine Fight for the Falklnds p. 295
9. Middlebrook, The Argentine Fight for the Falklnds p. 82

Cardiff in the 90's

In 1990 "Cardiff" deployed on one of the last peacetime Armilla patrols from January to June 1990 before the invasion of Kuwait. In August 1990 she was ordered back down to Dubai as part of Operation Granby and went via Gibraltar in the Autumn of 1990. Cardiff was deployed to the Persian Gulf as part of a Royal Navy taskforce sent to take part in the Gulf War. On 24 January, Cardiff sighted three Iraqi vessels operating from the occupied Kuwaiti island of Qaruh. Her Lynx helicopter destroyed two of the vessels, which later turned out to be minesweepers.

In 2003, Cardiff returned to the Persian Gulf on a six-month deployment as Armilla Patrol ship. She returned home in August 2003.

It was announced in July 2004, as part of the Delivering Security in a Changing World review, that Cardiff would be decommissioned in August 2005. Decommissioned July 2005 in Portsmouth.

v t e Type 42 destroyers
Royal Navy	Sheffield Birmingham Cardiff Coventry Newcastle Glasgow Exeter Southampton Nottingham Liverpool Manchester York Gloucester Edinburgh
Argentine Navy Hércules class	Hércules Santísima Trinidad
Preceded by: HMS Bristol Followed by: Type 45 destroyers
List of destroyers of the Royal Navy List of destroyers of the Argentine Navy

• Falklands War
• Type 42 destroyers
• Royal Navy destroyers
• Cold War destroyers of the United Kingdom
• Barrow-built ships