Construction
The Type 42 destroyers (also known as the Sheffield-class) were made in three batches; Cardiff was built in the first. She cost over £30 million, which was double her original quoted price. Her keel was laid down on 6 November 1972, at Vickers Shipbuilding and Engineering Ltd in Cumbria. The build was interrupted by a labour shortage at Vickers. To solve this problem, she was towed to Swan Hunter in Tyne and Wear and completed there.
Type 42s were designed as anti-aircraft vessels primarily equipped with the Sea Dart, a surface-to-air missile system capable of hitting targets up to 56 kilometres (30 nmi) away. Cardiff’s secondary weapon system was a 4.5 inch Mark 8 naval gun, capable of firing 21-kilogram (46 lb) shells to a range of 22 kilometres (12 nmi). After the Falklands War, in which two Type 42s were sunk by enemy aircraft, the entire class was equipped with the Phalanx close-in weapon system, a Gatling cannon that fires 3,000 rounds per minute and is designed to shoot down anti-ship missiles.
Read more about this topic: HMS Cardiff (D108)
Famous quotes containing the word construction:
“There’s no art
To find the mind’s construction in the face:
He was a gentleman on whom I built
An absolute trust.”
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616)
“There is, I think, no point in the philosophy of progressive education which is sounder than its emphasis upon the importance of the participation of the learner in the formation of the purposes which direct his activities in the learning process, just as there is no defect in traditional education greater than its failure to secure the active cooperation of the pupil in construction of the purposes involved in his studying.”
—John Dewey (1859–1952)
“No construction stiff working overtime takes more stress and straining than we did just to stay high.”
—Gus Van Sant, U.S. screenwriter and director, and Dan Yost. Bob Hughes (Matt Dillon)