June and July, the ship made visits to ports in New Zealand, Vanuatu, and the Solomon Islands. Brisbane attended RIMPAC during April and May 1990, then returned to Australia to prepare for deployment to the Persian Gulf as part of Operation Damask. Operation Damask Brisbane arrived in the Gulf on 6 December 1990 to serve as part of the naval blockade. She was attached to the United States Navy battle group from 17 January to 28 February 1991. In late March, the destroyer sailed home via Singapore. Brisbane was awarded the Meritorious Unit Citation by the Australian government for her actions during Operation Damask. Brisbane also earned a second battle honour, "Kuwait 1990–91". 1990s and 2000s During late 1992, Brisbane was operating in South-east Asia. The ship spent most of 1993 exercising along Australia's east coast, then docked for a refit lasting from August 1993 until May 1994. The destroyer was deployed to South-east Asia for exercises, flag-showing, and port visits on four occasions between 1994 and 1996, then again in late 1998. During August 1999, Brisbane participated in Exercise Kakadu. During this, a fire broke out in the ship's forward gun turret, which was quickly extinguished. In March 2000, Brisbane was one of three RAN ships to participate in a Royal New Zealand Navy fleet concentration period. Decommissioning and fate Brisbane paid off on 19 October 2001. Among the initial ideas for the ship's disposal was a proposal to donate the destroyer to the Australian National Maritime Museum as a replacement for the Daring-class destroyer . Brisbane was eventually marked for scuttling as a dive wreck off the coast of Queensland. Her bridge and one of her guns were removed and preserved at the Australian War Memorial in Canberra, which were incorporated into the post-1945 galleries, which opened in 2007. The ship's air search radar was donated to the Royal Thai Navy in 2002 to help the Thais maintain their naval capabilities. Brisbane was sunk approximately off the coast of Mudjimba, Sunshine Coast, Queensland, on 31 July 2005 in of water. Brisbane was filled with of concrete, and 38 small charges were detonated to breach the hull. Brisbane sank in two minutes and ten seconds, coming to rest with the keel embedded a metre into the seabed and facing the ocean currents, and the uppermost part of the ship below sea level. The wreck site has been colonised by