Spanish shipbuilder Navantia held a steel cutting ceremony at its San Fernando shipyard on January 15 to officially mark the start of construction of the first Royal Saudi Navy Avante 2200 corvette. The ceremony was attended by company officials and representatives from the navies of Saudi Arabia an
German Navy minehunter FGS Dillingen will be departing its Kiel homeport on January 21 to join the Standing NATO Mine Counter Measures Group (SNMCMG1) for a six-month deployment. The vessel will first head for Zeebruge, Belgium, where it will join the international task group. After Dillingen joins
Frigates, destroyers and an aircraft carrier from four nations are currently underway in the Persian Gulf as part of the annual, multinational exercise Intrepid Sentinel 2019. The multilateral exercise is designed to increase capability and interoperability between the four nations. According to pho
The Spanish Navy’s Álvaro de Bazán-class frigate ESPS Méndez Núñez (F 104) arrived at Naval Station Norfolk on January 14 where it will become part of Carrier Strike Group (CSG) 12 and conduct joint training and exercises. Méndez Núñez, homeported in Ferrol, Spain, was commissioned in 2006. She join
Royal Navy survey ship HMS Protector broke through nearly 300 miles of Antarctic ice to help scientists begin a five-year mission to understand how West Antarctica is contributing to global sea-level rise. Working together with British Antarctic Survey’s vessel RRS Ernest Shackleton, the Plymouth-ba
Type 23 frigate HMS Montrose arrived at Devonport Naval Base in Auckland, New Zealand, on Tuesday, becoming the first Royal Navy ship to do so in 20 years. Welcoming the frigate to Auckland was the crew of Royal New Zealand Navy multi-purpose vessel HMNZS Canterbury who performed the traditional hak
The French Navy officially received its first Rafale M fighter jet upgraded to the F3-R standard in a ceremony at the Landivisiau Naval Air Base. The first flight of F3-R from Landivisiau took place on December 17, the defense ministry said. The aircraft was delivered after the upgrade was approved
The Royal Navy will deploy Type 23 frigate HMS Montrose to Japan later this year, where the ship will contribute to the enforcement of UN sanctions on North Korea. Montrose will be the fourth British warship to visit Japan and operate in the region in the past 12 months. Fellow Plymouth-based frigat
French missile systems specialist MBDA announced they tested the Mistral missile against fast boats such as fast inshore attack craft in a demonstration in front of a number of foreign delegations. The firing was performed from a SIMBAD-RC automated naval turret firing from the land against a fast m
The UK defense ministry announced it has awarded Babcock’s Rosyth dockyard a £5 million contract for the first planned dry-dock maintenance of the Royal Navy aircraft carrier HMS Queen Elizabeth. As announced by defense minister Stuart Andrew, the contract will allow the 65,000-tonne carrier to unde
US Navy amphibious dock landing ship USS Fort McHenry (LSD 43) arrived in Constanta, Romania, on January 7 for the first scheduled port visit of its Black Sea tour. The Whidbey Island-class ship stopped in Romania after becoming the first US Navy ship to enter Black Sea since the Kerch Strait incide
An Indian Navy frigate reached a milestone recently as it became the first Indian warship to escort a vessel of UN’s World Food Program. INS Sunayna completed the escort for the first time since counter-piracy deployments began in 2008, following an escort request by EU NAVFOR. A WFP dhow was transp
The Royal Netherlands Navy’s air defense and command frigate HNLMS Evertsen got underway from her homeport in Den Helder on January 5 to become the flagship of NATO’s Standing Maritime Group 2 (SNMG 2). Evertsen will spend the next six months in the Mediterranean and Black Seas patrolling the region
Whidbey Island-class dock landing ship USS Fort McHenry (LSD 43) entered the Black Sea on Sunday, becoming the first US Navy ship to do so since the Kerch Strait incident from November 2018 when Russia fired on, and seized, three Ukrainian Navy ships near the the Kerch Strait. USS Fort McHenry, with
