Representatives from Australia, U.S. and Japan commemorated the 75th anniversary of the Battle of the Coral Sea aboard Australian Navy amphibious ship HMAS Choules which positioned herself in the waters of the conflict off Townsville on May 1. The ship’s company and embarked forces took a break from
A report on the Australian government’s handling of the Future Submarine acquisition was complimented by the Australian National Audit Office (ANAO) in a report released on April 27. Commenting on the report, Australia’s Minister for Defence Industry said the ANAO has independently verified that the
Royal Australian Navy frigate HMAS Ballarat and Royal Canadian Navy ships HMCS Ottawa and Winnipeg recently completed a series of underway exercises in the waters of South East Asia. The exercises, conducted in international waters from 19-21 April, included close quarters manoeuvring, practicing re
Members of the Five Power Defence Arrangements started exercise Bersama Shield 2017 on April 27 in Malaysia and Singapore. The long-running Bersama exercise series aims to enhance the interoperability between the founding members of the Five Power Defence Arrangements (FPDA) – Australia, Malaysia, N
The U.S. Navy would have to spend $102 billion per year to build and operate a 355 ship navy, an analysis by the Congressional Budget Office has concluded. The assessment was carried out by the agency after the navy released a new force structure assessment in December 2016 which called for a 355 sh
Australia started the construction phase of the replacement Pacific Patrol Boat program with a steel cutting ceremony in Western Australia on April 26. Up to 21 steel-hulled vessels are set to replace the existing fleet of Pacific Patrol Boats as part of Australia’s new Pacific Maritime Security Pro
Australian shipbuilder Forgacs, through its parent company Civmec Construction and Engineering Pty Ltd, marked the first day of construction of their purpose built ship and module construction, ship repair and maintenance facility. The 29,000 square meter, 18-storey high, facility is an investment o
Responding to an article about faulty maintenance works on the Australian Navy’s two biggest warships, Australia’s deputy chief of navy said the article was “incorrect and misleading in its assertions”. The Daily Telegraph published an article which claimed the reason for the breakdown of the Canber
Faulty maintenance works are reportedly the reason why the Royal Australian Navy’s two Canberra-class landing helicopter docks spent the last month tied to port. Navy chiefs are now looking into what happened during maintenance works on the $1.5 billion warships, according to the Australian Daily Te
The Royal Australian Navy received its first Cape-class patrol boat during a delivery ceremony held at Austal’s Henderson shipyard in Western Australia. The Australian Defence Vessel (ADV) Cape Fourcroy is the first of two 58 metre patrol vessels that will be chartered by the Commonwealth of Austral
French shipbuilder DCNS has signed an agreement with Australia’s Defence Materials Technology Centre (DMTC) to collaborate on naval shipbuilding and repairs. According to DMTC, the agreement will see DMTC and DCNS collaborate on developing technical expertise and building industrial capacity within
Two AK-47s seized by the Royal Australian Navy during Operation MANITOU were presented to the Australian War Memorial to maintain the historic record of Defence’s contributions in the Middle East. The weapons were intercepted by HMAS Darwin off the coast of Oman in March 2016, when she was conductin
Late on Saturday night during a European Union counter-piracy patrol close to the east coast of Somalia, EU NAVFOR’s Spanish flagship, ESPS Galicia, received a SOS distress call from the master of merchant ship, MT Costina, to say that his vessel was being attacked by a number of armed pirates in a
Earlier this month USNS Kanawha replenished ESPS Galicia of EU NAVFOR Operation Atalanta at sea (RAS). Having sailed into the counter-piracy sea areas in the Gulf of Aden, the flag ship of Operation Atalanta, ESPS Galicia went alongside USNS Kanawha to replenish fuel and stores in preparation for he
