Naval

  • CHINESE NAVY: China’s worst kept secret

    CHINESE NAVY: China’s worst kept secret

    27th July 2011

    China has taken a significant step forward in its ambitions for a fleet of aircraft carriers after readying its first such vessel for sea trials. After almost a decade of renovation work, the hull of an unfinished Soviet Kuznetsov class…

  • ROYAL FLEET AUX: RFA underpins exercise

    ROYAL FLEET AUX: RFA underpins exercise

    13th July 2011

    The Royal Fleet Auxiliary (RFA) stores ship Fort Rosalie replenished the assault ship HMS Albion and the Navy’s largest warship, helicopter carrier HMS Ocean, in the Mediterranean in May during Exercise Cypriot Lion, which combined air defence exercises and live…

  • US NAVY: Maiden cruise for nuclear carrier

    US NAVY: Maiden cruise for nuclear carrier

    30th June 2011

    USS George H. W. Bush, the United States’ newest aircraft carrier, has embarked on her maiden deployment. The 2009-built Nimitz class vessel is accompanied by the cruisers Anzio and Gettysburg and the destroyers Mitscher and Truxton, also on her first…

  • DECOMMISSIONING: ‘Fighting G’ bows out

    DECOMMISSIONING: ‘Fighting G’ bows out

    30th June 2011

    Another of the Royal Navy’s old guard has passed into history, with the decommissioning of HMS Gloucester on 30 June. The Type 42 destroyer will be best remembered for the first successful missile versus missile engagement of its kind in…

  • GERMAN NAVY: Long term investment

    GERMAN NAVY: Long term investment

    30th June 2011

    Production of the first Type 125 frigate for the German Navy got underway on 9 May with a steel-cutting ceremony at the Blohm + Voss shipyard in Hamburg. The four ships of the class are to be built by a…

  • ICE PATROL: To survey and protect

    ICE PATROL: To survey and protect

    30th June 2011

    The Royal Navy has a new interim Antarctic patrol vessel. The leased icebreaker was commissioned HMS Protector on 23 June, a date that coincided with the 50th anniversary of the implementation of the Antarctic Treaty. The ship had arrived in…

  • FRENCH NAVY: The sovereignty enforcer

    FRENCH NAVY: The sovereignty enforcer

    30th June 2011

    DCNS has launched its first Gowind type offshore patrol vessel. The 87m L’Adroit is unusual in being an entirely self-funded showcase project with eleven companies supplying systems and equipment free of charge. Once the ship is completed later this year…

  • ROYAL NAVY: Antarctic patrol vessel named

    16th June 2011

    In a ceremony in Portsmouth the Royal Navy’s new Antarctic patrol vessel was officially named HMS ‘Protector’ before being formally commissioned into the Navy’s fleet on Thursday, June 23rd. The ‘Protector’ has been leased from Norway’s GC Rieber Shipping for…

  • IRAQI NAVY: Iraq’s self-sufficiency

    IRAQI NAVY: Iraq’s self-sufficiency

    1st June 2011

    An eight-year mission safeguarding two important oil platforms has come to an end for Coalition forces, with the Iraqi Navy taking over full responsibility for their security. Since the fall of the Saddam regime in 2003, the waters around the…

  • NEW FRIGATES: First dancing steps

    NEW FRIGATES: First dancing steps

    27th May 2011

    Aquitaine, lead ship of the FREMM multi-mission frigate project, put to sea for the first time on 18 April, a month ahead of schedule. The 6,000-tonne frigate conducted initial sea trials off the Brittany peninsula lasting several weeks. Key among…

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