§ Mr. JenkinTo ask the Secretary of State for Defence which ships his Department has used for target practice during the past five years. [127116]
§ Mr. IngramThe Ministry of Defence has a continuous requirement to trial and evaluate, under live conditions, the operational effectiveness of its weapon systems—in particular to prove their effectiveness against predicted results from modelling. As part of this requirement, the RN periodically conducts High Seas Firings (HSF) against targets, and uses the results to aid the continued tactical development of its weapons systems whilst also supporting research on survivability of current and future United Kingdom warship design and protection of personnel.
During the past five years, the Department has arranged one HSF using ex-HMS Sirius as the target vessel. This was conducted between 28–29 September 1998. The RN also participated in two HSF exercises arranged by and at the invitation of the US Navy using ex USS Ashtabula and ex USS Wainwright on 14 October 2000 and 11 June 2002 respectively.