MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

HMS York almost home after high profile patrolling in Falklands’ waters

The 25 year old Type 42 destroyer

HMS York is on her way home from the South Atlantic after a high-profile five months on patrol off the Falklands Islands, reports The Press from York.

The Type 42 destroyer made the headlines earlier this year when she had an encounter at sea with an Argentine warship. Relationships between Argentina and Britain are currently strained after the UK started making exploratory oil drilling off the Falklands.

The encounter between ARA Drummond and HMS York occurred in January before the diplomatic flare-up and the British Ministry of Defence reported that a storm had blown the Argentine ship off course so that she was too close to the Islands.

She obeyed HMS York’s instructions to change course and no further action was taken.
Since the 1982 conflict, the Royal Navy has maintained a constant patrol of the Falklands area by warships, often by Type 42 destroyers.

HMS York is now heading north again. Before leaving the Falklands, she celebrated her 25th birthday, having been commissioned in 1985 and a contingent from the ship also took part in a Queen’s Birthday Parade in Port Stanley.

She was involved in a dramatic 300-mile rescue in heavy seas of a South Pacific fisherman from the Republic of Kiribati.
 

The trip home is now well underway having sailed from Fortaleza in Northern Brazil with two more stops before Portsmouth in the Canary Islands and Portugal.