'No plans' to fit 30mm guns to Royal Navy aircraft carriers HMS Prince of Wales and HMS Queen Elizabeth
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The government has “no plans” to fit ferocious guns to the Royal Navy aircraft carriers - despite initial installation designs.
Defence minister Lord Coaker, Labour peer in the House of Lords, said HMS Prince of Wales and HMS Queen Elizabeth will not be fitted with 30mm naval guns. Even with the increasing threat of drones to warships, the project to install them is not expected to take place.
Mr Coaker stressed that the Queen Elizabeth-class carriers already protected by a layered defence approach. Responding to a parliamentary written question from Lord Lee of Trafford, he said: “There are no plans to fit a 30mm weapon system to HMS Queen Elizabeth or HMS Prince of Wales.
“The Queen Elizabeth-class carriers are equipped with a range of defensive systems, which along with escort vessels and wider force protection measures, provide a layered defensive system that is effective against a wide range of threats, including emerging un-crewed aerial threats.”
The UK Defence Journal reports that the ships have been designed with four positions for 30mm gun systems. None of these have been used since the ships entered service. The weapons use an electro-optical director and can be controlled from elsewhere on the vessel. This allows operators to track and strike down targets without a direct line-of-sight from the mount itself.
It can fire at multiple target types at ranges of up to roughly 5km. Ammunition can be changed depending on the threat. The 30mm was originally introduced to deal with swarming boat attacks, but it has now become a standard close-range weapon across surface combatants alongside the Phalanx close-in weapon systems.
Work is continuing to fix HMS Queen Elizabeth, currently in Babcock's dry dock in Rosyth, Scotland. Issues were reported during routine machinery trials, with the second phase of repairs starting in September last year. The clock is ticking for the ship to return from her seven-month planned lay off.
Navy Lookout reports that repairs are “several months behind schedule”, with the Royal Navy being tight-lipped about the progress. HMS Prince of Wales is currently alongside HMNB Portsmouth.