Royal Navy plane service HMS Prince of Wales has transited north by the Bab al-Mandab Strait and entered the Pink Sea on October 27, based on satellite tv for pc imagery and ship-tracking information.
The transfer marks the service’s return from its Indo-Pacific deployment because it makes its means towards the Mediterranean.
The eight-month mission, Operation Highmast, has been one of the intensive Royal Navy deployments in years. HMS Prince of Wales led a multinational service strike group by the Indian and Pacific Oceans, working alongside naval forces from Japan, South Korea, Norway, Canada, Spain, and different allies. The deployment aimed to bolster partnerships, develop interoperability, and display the UK’s capability to undertaking energy throughout world sea lanes.
HMS Prince of Wales by the Bab al-Mandab Strait on the twenty sixth, now within the Pink Sea, Mediterranean certain. pic.twitter.com/xoi02slLTU
— Britsky (@TBrit90) October 27, 2025
Earlier this 12 months, the service had entered the Indo-Pacific through the Suez Canal and the Pink Sea, starting the japanese leg of her deployment. By September, the strike group was working within the Sea of Japan, conducting advanced joint workout routines with Japan’s Air Self-Protection Pressure and South Korea’s Navy. The drills included coordinated flight operations between British F-35B Lightning II jets and Japan’s F-15 and F-35A plane, in addition to superior medical evacuation and damage-control simulations involving allied vessels.
The strike group contains destroyer HMS Dauntless, frigate HMS Richmond, help ship RFA Tidespring, and companion vessels similar to Norway’s Roald Amundsen. Round 4,500 British personnel are supporting the deployment, together with sailors, Royal Marines, troopers, and RAF aircrew. The group’s onboard medical groups, bolstered by the Maritime Medical Emergency Response Staff (MMERT), additionally not too long ago carried out a sequence of high-intensity coaching missions that examined their rapid-response functionality at sea.
For its transit by the Pink Sea, HMS Prince of Wales has been joined by a United States Navy Arleigh Burke-class destroyer. The US vessel is a part of the multinational effort to safeguard maritime site visitors amid continued assaults by Yemen’s Houthi motion.
Since late 2023, the Iran-backed Houthis have focused business and naval vessels within the Pink Sea and Bab al-Mandab Strait, prompting a joint response below Operation Prosperity Guardian, led by the USA and United Kingdom.
British warships, together with Kind 45 destroyers, have beforehand intercepted incoming drones and missiles within the area, defending transport lanes very important to world commerce.