24 additional Sea-Ceptor missiles for British Type 45 destroyers

Like the Horizon air defense frigates of the French Navy and the Italian Navy, the 6 British Type 45 destroyers of the Daring class are equipped, for anti-aircraft defense, with 6 vertical launch systems of SYLVER 50 missiles for 48 silos containing a mix of Aster 15 missiles with a range of 30 km, and Aster 30 missiles with a range greater than 120 km.

Referred to as Sea Viper by the Royal Navy, this system provides overall protection to the destroyer, as well as the ships it escorts, against many types of threats, such as combat aircraft or anti-ship missiles.

In addition, and again like the 4 Horizon frigates, each destroyer has a reserved space at the front of the ship, allowing it to receive, if necessary, 2 additional Sylver systems, i.e. 16 Aster missiles.

Royal Navy Type 45 Destroyers will receive 24 Sea-Ceptor missiles

But the Royal Navy will ultimately have decided in favor of another alternative when modernizing its ships, in order to strengthen their operational potential and face new threats that have emerged since the design of the building in the early 2000s. .

In a mixture of budgetary opportunism and operational anticipation, this will, in fact, place in place of this reserved space, a Sea Ceptor system with 24 CAMM (Common Anti-Air Modular Missile) missiles designed by MBDA and with a range greater than 25 km (and therefore an alternative to the Aster 15) which will be taken from one of the Type 23 frigates which will soon be withdrawn from service, and which had received this system during their last phase of modernization.

At the same time, the Aster 15s in SYLVER silos will be replaced by Aster 30s, providing each ship with impressive anti-aircraft firepower, in addition to versatility and an ability to resist saturation attacks equivalent to that of the best destroyers of the moment, such as the US Navy's Arleigh Burke Flight III, or the Japanese Maya.

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