Brit's new destroyer launched despite defective missiles

Daily Mail:

At last, the Royal Navy has something to cheer about. As of today, it has a new and suitably menacing £1 billion ship which should form a central plank of Britain's defences for the next 30 years.

Yesterday morning, with the top brass assembled on a Portsmouth quayside, a chap from British Aerospace handed over the keys to one of the most advanced ships in the world and a chap in a uniform raised the Royal Navy's white ensign. HMS Dauntless is now part of the Fleet. Watch your step, Johnny Foreigner . . .

Well, actually, don't worry yourself too much just yet. Dauntless is the second of six Type 45 destroyers which have been commissioned to protect the Royal Navy from pretty much any airborne threat the world can throw at it in the near future. The only problem is that its main armament doesn't work.

The so-called Sea Viper missile system, which is being designed in partnership with the French and Italians, is proving to be more of a sea sloth. The Sea Viper system constitutes a whopping £400million of the £1 billion cost of each Type 45 destroyer. And it should have been up and running by now.

In theory, its computers should be capable of monitoring 300 aircraft or missiles at the same time and whacking 48 missiles the size of a small car at anything hostile up to 250 miles away.

...

They should have used the Aegis system which has been proven to be effective for several years and can also do a credible job of missile defense.

It is an interesting ship. You can see a graphic of it here. This shot gives an interesting perspective on the size of the ship.