The Danish government temporarily closed off the Great Belt strait of the coast of Denmark yesterday (4 April), following the failure of a missile launcher during a military exercise in the region.
Great Belt tightened
The BBC reports that Denmark’s National Maritime Authority warned shippers to avoid specific parts of the strait between the major islands of Funen and Zealand, where there is said to be a risk of “falling missile fragments”.
It also closed the airspace above the region.
The strait, which is one of the world’s busiest, has since been reopened.
Missile problems
A missile launcher was said to have been activated as part of a regular military exercise, but failed to deactivate. This meant there was a risk that missiles could have been launched across the section of the strait which was closed.
Danish maritime authorities noted that the Great Belt bridge connecting Zealand and Funen via the small island of Sprogø remained open at all points.
The missile at risk of launching was not armed, the government has emphasised, and its 150kg of explosives would not detonate on impact.
Naval re-organisation
The missile mishap is not the only news regarding a firing in Denmark this week.
The country’s contributions to resolving the Red Sea shipping crisis were complicated yesterday when the government sacked general Flemming Lentfer, the Chief of Defence.
The dismissal came after it emerged that the Ivar Huitfeldt frigate, sent to the Red Sea to protect commercial shipping, had experienced a half-hour-long malfunction of its own missile and radar systems during a drone attack by Houthi rebels on 9 March.
A report by Danish news outlet Olfi contradicted the line of the ship’s captain, Sune Lund, who denied the malfunction, and suggested that the fault had been known about years before it occurred.