Shambles as second carrier fails to set sail for Nato exerecise

THE departure of HMS Prince of Wales from Portsmouth has been postponed as it was about to set sail to replace its sister aircraft carrier - which was forced to cancel its own deployment a week ago.

- Ben Mitchell

People lined the walls of Portsmouth harbour to watch the 65,000-tonne warship yesterday.

But after Ministry of Defence police boats had secured the area and the harbour mouth was closed to traffic the channel was reopened and Prince of Wales failed to leave the jetty. One member of the public who had come to wave off the carrier said: "I hope it hasn't broken down again." After about 20 minutes, the hundreds of people gathered to see the ship started to disperse as word spread it was staying.