[1] She was fitted with a hangar and helideck aft to allow operation of a single Westland Wasp helicopter, while two surveying launches were carried.

[1][3] On 21 April 1971, two launches attached to HMS Hecate were towed out to sea and bombed by the Provisional Irish Republican Army while the vessels were moored at Baltimore, Republic of Ireland.

[4][5] In the mid-1970s HMS Hecate was in the Persian Gulf surveying the entrance areas in the event of conflicts while based in Bandar Abbas, Iran.

In November 1981 while on a routine visit to Nantes, France, an attempt was made to sink the vessel using a bomb placed on the hull by divers.

[6] Hecate was undamaged and conducted North Atlantic surveys for the next 4 months, visiting Gibraltar, Tangiers, Madeira and Lisbon.

The New Year was spent at the Falkland Islands before Hecate became the first Royal Navy ship to visit South America following the hostilities.