{"id":641899,"date":"2026-06-16T16:13:13","date_gmt":"2026-06-16T16:13:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/641899\/"},"modified":"2026-06-16T16:13:13","modified_gmt":"2026-06-16T16:13:13","slug":"russian-frigate-fires-warning-shots-at-british-yacht-in-channel-reports-ministry-of-defence","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/641899\/","title":{"rendered":"Russian frigate fires warning shots at British yacht in Channel \u2013 reports | Ministry of Defence"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Ministry of Defence<\/a> is investigating reports that a Russian frigate, the Admiral Grigorovich, fired warning shots within 500 metres of a British yacht sailing a little over 20 miles south of the Isle of Wight.<\/p>\n

No injuries or damage have been reported by the yacht, which continued its journey. A boat from HMS Tyne, a patrol vessel, has visited the yacht to gather details and check the crew are safe.<\/p>\n

The incident came just days after the UK seized a Russia-linked oil tanker<\/a> off the coast of the Isle of Wight, the first time British forces have led the seizure of a sanctioned vessel since the start of the war against Ukraine.<\/p>\n

The MoD said: \u201cWe are investigating reports of an incident in the Channel\u201d.<\/p>\n

However, defence sources said they were viewing it as an isolated episode, not linked to the UK interception of the Smyrtos.<\/p>\n

The Admiral Grigorovich has been regularly deployed near British waters<\/a> this year. It has regularly escorted Russian shadow fleet vessels in the Channel and North Sea and refuelled off the Suffolk coast to remain near the UK.<\/p>\n

It is normally shadowed by Royal Navy<\/a> vessels when it sails close to UK territorial waters. The frigate was being monitored by HMS Mersey, another offshore patrol ship, at the time.<\/p>\n

The warship is the first in a class of frigates nearly 125 metres in length and with a crew of up to 220. Its main 100mm gun is able to fire 80 rounds a minute at a range of more than 20km and engage multiple targets.<\/p>\n

Shooting incidents are extremely rare in peacetime.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Ministry of Defence is investigating reports that a Russian frigate, the Admiral Grigorovich, fired warning shots within…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":641900,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[49,50,51,47,52,48],"class_list":["post-641899","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-headlines","tag-news","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/641899","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=641899"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/641899\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/641900"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=641899"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=641899"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=641899"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}