We don’t often get to hear about the Royal navy’s mine countermeasures ships but they form part of the RN crown jewels, they really do deliver a world beating capability that would be near the top of my list of ‘capability plus’ areas that we should maintain and increase resources for.
Four Royal Navy (RN) mine countermeasures vessels (MCMVs) fitted with Thales UK’s minehunting sonars have been taking part in a series of important joint exercises with the US Navy (USN) in the Arabian Gulf, where their detection performance has been described by the RN as ‘world beating’.
The exercises were designed to enable the two navies to further develop minehunting techniques in the warm, shallow waters of the Gulf, a busy and important international maritime environment.
The RN force consisted of two Hunt-class MCMVs (HMS Middleton and HMS Chiddingfold) and two Sandown-class vessels (HMS Grimsby and HMS Pembroke).
The Hunt-class fleet is fitted with Sonar 2193, the world’s most advanced hull-mounted wideband minehunting sonar; the Sandown class operates with Sonar 2093, the most successful variable-depth multi-mode sonar in its field.
The exercise was an opportunity for the Commander (Cdr) UK Mine Counter Measures Force to personally direct a multi-ship, bi-lateral mine countermeasures task force at sea.
The four USN Avenger-class ships were USS Ardent, USS Dexterous, USS Gladiator and USS Scout.
Cdr David Bence RN, Cdr UK Mine Counter Measures Force, said
“Widely acknowledged as one of the world leaders in MCM, the RN has both the capability and intent to conduct expeditionary MCM operations in support of wider maritime and defence objectives. Utilising world-leading sonar and mine-disposal technology, the RN retains the capability to counter modern sea mines in the most challenging of environmental conditions.
Already proven in more temperate waters around the UK, Thales’s 2093 and 2193 sonars have performed exceptionally well in the challenging environmental conditions of the Arabian Gulf. With capabilities that complement each other, they provided a high probability of detection of sea mines – from shallow to deep water – in highly saline water with high ambient sea temperatures. They are world beaters.
The four RN MCMVs are forward-deployed to the Gulf region for several years at a time. They are maintained locally and crew members are rotated with counterparts in the UK on a regular basis.
The Hunt class are the worlds largest Glass Reinforced Plastic (GRP) ships.
BAe Systems has also secured a £15m contract to upgrade the propulsion systems on the Hunt class vessels.
Thank god we appear to be good at something
We are good at it – been there, done that, got the T shirt and the campaign medal, but I was a communications specialist (from the “big navy”), and we used to say rather negative things about our specialists (in the way of the armed forces) so:
MW ratings are called MUPPETS = Most Useless Person Purser Ever Trained
and Clearance Divers are the biggest bunch of over paid posers that ever existed (“here Jed, have you seen my new Rolex ?”)
BUT – all joking aside, they are indeed very good at what they do bless em !
Small Ship Wets……
Plastic bump hats (think building sites) provided ostensibly in case ship lifted up violently by mine detonation – actually because Hunt’s become “vomit comets” in anything above sea state 3 !
I thought it was most USEFUL person the pusser ever trained – something about it being said by King George V around the First World War, speaking to the crews of converted trawlers that were the first minesweepers? Happy to be disproved!
Dear Somewhat – I am sure your probably correct, you can count on the rest of the Non-Mine Warfare fleet to have corrupted it to meet our own detrimental needs….
Once a muppet, always a muppet! Just keeping our end up!