British Forces: Facing Rockets Launched from Yemen at More than Triple the Speed of Sound

The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) quoted the captain of HMS Diamond Pete Evans as saying that the Yemenis are now using more advanced and more lethal weapons.

This was also confirmed by Lt Cdr Martyn Harris, Diamond's executive officer, in his statement to the BBC, where he said: "They had just two minutes to react to launches, with the missile traveling at more than three times the speed of sound."

In the report prepared by Jonathan Beale, a defense affairs correspondent at the BBC from inside the British destroyer HMS Diamond, it was revealed that the British forces are unable to face Yemeni rockets. 

Diamond's Captain told the BBC that when the ship first entered the Red Sea in December, one-way attack drones, or UAVs, were the main threat. But Yemen has "moved much more into conventional and ballistic missiles which are harder to defend against and cause much more damage".

Evans called it a challenging tempo of operations, in hot and sticky conditions. "The levels of concentration [are] exhausting," he stated, with "long periods of nothing much happening, and then a few really short intense spikes of your life being at risk".

The 224 military personnel on board work mostly on shifts between eight and 12 hours, leaving little time to relax.

Meanwhile, navigator Lt Josh Tyrie told the BBC: "There's a regular drumbeat of drones and missiles, so there's a good possibility that will happen."

Lt Tyrie said that the entire crew had changed from their blue uniforms to fire-resistant white overalls. We'd all been issued anti-flash hoods and gloves to wear in case the ship was hit.

The BBC confirmed that the HMS Diamond in the Red Sea has not shot down any Yemeni missiles; it only faces drones. It has been targeted by Yemen in the recent period, facing a deadly attack by a large number of drones, described by the ship's electronic warfare director as a large swarm attack that rapidly escalated.