HMS Danae (F47): The Frigate That Played "HMS Hero" on the BBC

The Build: Devonport

HMS Danae was built at Devonport Dockyard, laid down on 16 December 1964, launched on 31 October 1965, and commissioned on 10 October 1967, a Leander-class frigate displacing 3,200 long tons at full load, capable of 28 knots, and carrying a crew of 223.

She entered service armed with twin 4.5-inch guns, Sea Cat missiles and a Limbo anti-submarine mortar, a well-rounded general-purpose frigate typical of her highly successful class.

Gibraltar, Britannia and the Beira Patrol

Between 1968 and 1969, HMS Danae served as Gibraltar guardship, escorted the royal yacht HMY Britannia during a visit to South America, and took part in the Beira Patrol, the long-running Royal Navy operation enforcing an oil embargo against Rhodesia off the coast of Mozambique.

She went on to deploy to the Far East, visiting Australia, New Zealand and Japan, before returning home in October 1969 after a twelve-month deployment, a truly global tour for a single commission.

A Television Star

HMS Danae's most unusual claim to fame came in 1975, when she was used as the fictional HMS Hero in the BBC drama series Warship, with six episodes filmed aboard the real ship that year, giving HMS Danae a small but genuine place in British television history alongside her more conventional naval service, a rare instance of a working Royal Navy frigate doubling as a screen prop for a national broadcaster.

Modernisation and the Falklands

HMS Danae deployed to the Far East again between 1974 and 1975, sailing via South Africa, the Red Sea and the Persian Gulf, and carried out North Atlantic duties including oil-rig and fishery protection, joining NATO's Standing Naval Force Atlantic along the way.

In 1977, she took part in the Fleet Review celebrating the Queen's Silver Jubilee, before undergoing a major reconstruction between August 1977 and September 1980 that replaced her original 4.5-inch gun with four Exocet missiles and upgraded her to operate the Lynx helicopter, a substantial modernisation reflecting the changing priorities of Cold War frigate design.

HMS Danae joined NATO's Standing Naval Force North Atlantic in January 1982, and that June, in the aftermath of the Falklands War, escorted HMS Illustrious to the South Atlantic, returning home in October that year.

She undertook a further Falkland Islands patrol in 1983, and made another South Atlantic voyage in 1985, keeping her directly involved in the ongoing British military presence around the islands well after the conflict itself had ended.

A New Life as BAE Morán Valverde

HMS Danae was decommissioned in 1991 and sold to the Ecuadorian Navy on 25 April that year, renamed BAE Morán Valverde with hull number FM-02. Ecuador subsequently upgraded her with Exocet missiles and Mistral air-defence systems, keeping her remarkably combat-relevant for a further considerable stretch of service.

She was finally decommissioned in October 2008 and scrapped from September 2010, closing out a career that had taken her from the Beira blockade and a supporting role in British television drama to more than four decades of active naval service under two different flags.