Royal Navy destroyer HMS Diamond suffers another fault during mission with HMS Queen Elizabeth

HMS Diamond has been forced to cut short its participations to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the Five Power Defence Agreements (FPDA) in Singapore after being hit with another fault on Monday.

The problem caused the Type 45 destroyer from Portsmouth to miss the last day of a Exercise Bersama Gold, an international war game in the South China Sea, between the coasts of Malaysia and Singapore.

The problem comes just weeks after Diamond was repaired following a disastrous failure of the warship’s power and propulsion system, which left her stranded in an Italian port for weeks.

Speaking of the latest technical woe to blight the ‘state-of-the-art’ destroyer, a spokesman for the Royal Navy told Shephard news agency: ‘Owing to technical issues, HMS Diamond was unable to participate in the final day of Exercise Bersama Gold.

‘The ship is in the Indian Ocean as part of the carrier strike group deployment, with HMS Diamond commemorating the 50th anniversary of the Five Power Defence Agreements by conducting multi-national training exercises.’

Exercise Bersama Gold will involve 2,600 personnel, 10 ships, one submarine, six maritime helicopters, three maritime patrol aircraft, 25 fighter aircraft, two support aircraft.

HMS Diamond was the only Royal Navy warship understood to be earmarked to join the exercise, which features contributions from Australia, Malaysia, New Zealand, Singapore – who form part of the FPDA with the United Kingdom.

The British Defence Singapore support unit in Sembawang, Singapore, is attempting to support repairs on Diamond, with the issue not thought to be engine related.

Earlier this year, Diamond was forced to separate from the carrier strike group deployment after suffering a serious defect in her propulsion system.

The UK fleet of six Type 45 destroyers are currently undergoing – or are due to begin – major overhauls to improve the ship’s engines, which have previously broken down in hotter waters.

The £160m ‘power improvement project’ will see ships having their engines upgraded throughout the 2020s.

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