Royal Australian Navy Discussions and Updates

[swerve]

We don't have enough left to spare any more, so there's no stock to choose from.

If you want second hand amphibs, you can ask the French when they're planning to replace Siroco (could be quite a wait), or talk to the Italians about San Giorgio & San Marco. If you want cheap amphibs, I believe Daesun in Korea has a design you can buy, either direct, or from PT PAL in Indonesia.

 

[Marc 1]

Skanky Bergen - by god that's a great looking ship eh?

Must be hard to command or conn such a vessel with a paper bag over your head (well, you'd want to wear one wouldn't you - just in case anybody saw you...)

Good thing its staying civillian - if you thought we had recruitment problems now for the navy...

 

[Australian_1000]

do you think they will re-paint Skanky Bergen in Australian storm grey?

 

[Abraham Gubler]

do you think they will re-paint Skanky Bergen in Australian storm grey?

It will only spend 18 of so months in ADF service before joining the Customs Marine Unit to replace the leased Ocean Protector. So any eventual colours scheme will be determined by Customs's needs not the Navy's. Customs like to paint their owned vessels an off white, very pale grey colour.

 

[Owly]

Skanky Bergen - by god that's a great looking ship eh?

Must be hard to command or conn such a vessel with a paper bag over your head (well, you'd want to wear one wouldn't you - just in case anybody saw you...)

Good thing its staying civillian - if you thought we had recruitment problems now for the navy...

Wait till they start seeing the upkeep invoices .... there is some very serious technology in that ship - all of which would be useless chasing a trawler deep in the southern ocean at a max speed of 14 knots - dynamic positioning is not really useful - unless you intend to keep very very still so the poachers dont see you :coffee

 

[weegee]

:rolling at the sitting still so no one can see you! especially with a ship that has a nice red hull no one would see that would they? haha Ships sailing by would just say look at the brick wall in the middle of the ocean and keep on sailing

 

[ASSAIL]

Thought bubble. For those who may know. Has there been any consideration for using the Skandi Bergen as a backup for DMS Seahorse Standard sm deep sea rescue?
I assume that the two ships are miles apart in capability as Bergen is the next generation vehicle.
Alternatively, we'll strip out the deep dive capability, weld up the moon pool, sell the dp system etc etc and not use the ship for what she was designed to do.

 

[ASSAIL]

Skandi Bergen

For those posters who have not seen these ships close up or seen what they do, they are awesome machines.
They are used to help construct all the seabed infrastructure in oil and gas fields.
They employ various ROV's, saturation diving facilities - Team RCC's etc. Their gas rooms are bigger than the average suburban CIG depot.
The ships are regular visitors to Darwin and I've had the privledge of having a good close inspection.
I can only assume that we have purchased her without all that capability fitted unless there are uses for her yet untold.

 

[Todjaeger]

For those posters who have not seen these ships close up or seen what they do, they are awesome machines.
They are used to help construct all the seabed infrastructure in oil and gas fields.
They employ various ROV's, saturation diving facilities - Team RCC's etc. Their gas rooms are bigger than the average suburban CIG depot.
The ships are regular visitors to Darwin and I've had the privledge of having a good close inspection.
I can only assume that we have purchased her without all that capability fitted unless there are uses for her yet untold.

From the DOF Subsea Rederi AS announcement here;

The ship will be delivered to COA without it's subsea equipment, hereunder 2 WROVs, 250 T crane, and launch and recovery systems for the two WROVs.

While I supposed it might be possible to add some sort of submarine rescue vehicle or system onto the Skanky Bergen, if the long-term plan is for the vessel to be transferred to Customs after RAN service I do not see why either service would wish to pay for such modifications.

What I am beginning to question more and more is whether someone with influence and/or decision making power in Gov't is attempting to merge Customs/BPC into the RAN, or is attempting the opposite by expanding Customs/BPC into a pseudo-Coast Guard using RAN coin.

-Cheers

 

[icelord]

While I supposed it might be possible to add some sort of submarine rescue vehicle or system onto the Skanky Bergen, if the long-term plan is for the vessel to be transferred to Customs after RAN service I do not see why either service would wish to pay for such modifications.

If we could all refer to it as HMAS skandi bergden, and when pronouncing think Swedish chef from the muppets, as it was a muppet who decided to lease this frigging thing...(before you get out of line, i know its being commissioned in the RAN, but im still reffering to it as HMAS as it sounds stupid...

What I am beginning to question more and more is whether someone with influence and/or decision making power in Gov't is attempting to merge Customs/BPC into the RAN, or is attempting the opposite by expanding Customs/BPC into a pseudo-Coast Guard using RAN coin.

-Cheers

Lathams old "coast guide" returns in all its glory, you can change leaders as many times as you want, but the party Machine still stands as do the staff!

 

[Todjaeger]

If we could all refer to it as HMAS skandi bergden, and when pronouncing think Swedish chef from the muppets, as it was a muppet who decided to lease this frigging thing...(before you get out of line, i know its being commissioned in the RAN, but im still reffering to it as HMAS as it sounds stupid...

Thanks, now I have the Swedish chef singing that stupid song ending with Mork, mork, mork running through my head.

Right about the muppet part, though apparently the ones making this decision are neither as educational or funny as the other Muppets.

-Cheers

 

[ASSAIL]

Thanks, now I have the Swedish chef singing that stupid song ending with Mork, mork, mork running through my head.

Pay and conditions vis a vis RAN? Sorry folks got a bit distracted with both the muppets and CAAM!

What I was asking here is; does the civilian crew get paid MUA award rates and conditions?, if so, how does this justify the Minister stating that crewing is "cheaper" than uniforms considering they will need double crewing, and further, if the MUA crews continue once the ship reverts to Customs will they revert to the Customs conditions?

In summary, this opens a pandora's box of entitlements that the uniforms, both customs and navy will be watching closely

 

[MickB]

The CAMM palletised air defense system as proposed to the British Army would make an effective, easy to deploy, all weather point defense system for Australia's new amphibs.

It could be deployed as needed just like the RBS 70 had been in the past.

If the Camm is also used as point defense on the Anzac II (Australianised Type 26?) the cost of purchase and support will be spread over a much greater number of missiles.

As this missile will be purchased is large numbers by all three British services, allied navies like Australia should have access an extensive supply train and future upgrades.

 

[ASSAIL]

The CAMM palletised air defense system as proposed to the British Army would make an effective, easy to deploy, all weather point defense system for Australia's new amphibs.

It could be deployed as needed just like the RBS 70 had been in the past.

If the Camm is also used as point defense on the Anzac II (Australianised Type 26?) the cost of purchase and support will be spread over a much greater number of missiles.

As this missile will be purchased is large numbers by all three British services, allied navies like Australia should have access an extensive supply train and future upgrades.

There are members with better credentials than me to respond to this fantasy.,
CAMM(M) is already a mature system coddled together for the last of the T23's and onto the T 26's

In case you haven't noticed, the RAN has not used a British missile since Seacat in the 60s/70s and for good reason (reliability and performance)
They are very focused on sustaining interoperability with the navy with which we have the strongest operational relationship, the USN
We already have many units fitted with ESSM argueably a superior performer to CAAM but also a reasonably mature system.
Why would we be planning to fit CAMM in a ship which will first join our fleet in over 10 years time and will remain in the fleet for another 30+ YEARS.
The logic re economy of scale is illogical when unit numbers are compared with the US.
The assumption that ANZAC II will be a joint T26 venture is not shared by the majority of members on this forum
Cheers

 

[StevoJH]

The CAMM palletised air defense system as proposed to the British Army would make an effective, easy to deploy, all weather point defense system for Australia's new amphibs.

It could be deployed as needed just like the RBS 70 had been in the past.

If the Camm is also used as point defense on the Anzac II (Australianised Type 26?) the cost of purchase and support will be spread over a much greater number of missiles.

As this missile will be purchased is large numbers by all three British services, allied navies like Australia should have access an extensive supply train and future upgrades.

It wont be in the same numbers that the current ESSM system is deployed in though. Probably doesn't have enough range to replace ESSM either.

I've presumed that ANZAC II will be based on the AWD/F-100 Hull as the design was purchased from the Spanish when the AWD decision was made.

 

[StobieWan]

In case you haven't noticed, the RAN has not used a British missile since Seacat in the 60s/70s and for good reason (reliability and performance)

Harsh You'd have been all right with SeaDart, nothing wrong with that beast.

But no, can't see any utility on RAN using CAMM - not if you already have ESSM in inventory - they're a bit more expensive than CAMM but have much better range so for the frigates etc, ESSM, yes please. There's bags of them out there, broad user base and every expectation of continuing development and testing for the future. CAMM works fine for what we need in terms of keeping the T23 fleet fresh.

 

[swerve]

ESSM is almost 3 times the weight (about the same as Aster 15), & semi-active, thus needing more shipboard kit. The CAMM soft launch system saves more weight & space (no hot exhaust to deal with) & greatly increases the flexibility of fitting.

The extra range of ESSM is nice, but you can fit either a lot more CAMM, or put it on smaller vessels, or for local defence of other vessels such as auxiliaries or amphibs which don't have, & to which you don't wish to fit, the gear needed for a missile like ESSM.

Depends on what you think more useful, really, & that depends on what else you have, not just the qualities of the missiles themselves.

 

[ADMk2]

The CAMM palletised air defense system as proposed to the British Army would make an effective, easy to deploy, all weather point defense system for Australia's new amphibs.

It could be deployed as needed just like the RBS 70 had been in the past.

If the Camm is also used as point defense on the Anzac II (Australianised Type 26?) the cost of purchase and support will be spread over a much greater number of missiles.

As this missile will be purchased is large numbers by all three British services, allied navies like Australia should have access an extensive supply train and future upgrades.

RAN could even more simply introduce the RIM-116 - Rolling Airframe Missile in either standalone SeaRam form or integrated launcher form should the LHD's self-defence capability be upgraded at some point too.

RAM will be available in larger numbers than CAMM unless sales really take off with it.

Or they could buy Simbad /Mistral SAM's and bolt them onto the ships if they really wanted.

There's no shortage of possible options out there, but any such upgrade is years away. We haven't even built the things yet, let alone considered deploying them into a threat environment where they might need better self defence capability...

 

[MickB]

RAN could even more simply introduce the RIM-116 - Rolling Airframe Missile in either standalone SeaRam form or integrated launcher form should the LHD's self-defence capability be upgraded at some point too.

RAM will be available in larger numbers than CAMM unless sales really take off with it.

Or they could buy Simbad /Mistral SAM's and bolt them onto the ships if they really wanted....

The idea behind the palletised CAMM is that it would belong to the Army and be deployed by them when not required on the amphibs, just like the RBS 70.

 

[MickB]

ESSM is almost 3 times the weight (about the same as Aster 15), & semi-active, thus needing more shipboard kit. The CAMM soft launch system saves more weight & space (no hot exhaust to deal with) & greatly increases the flexibility of fitting.

The extra range of ESSM is nice, but you can fit either a lot more CAMM, or put it on smaller vessels, or for local defence of other vessels such as auxiliaries or amphibs which don't have, & to which you don't wish to fit, the gear needed for a missile like ESSM.

Depends on what you think more useful, really, & that depends on what else you have, not just the qualities of the missiles themselves.

These are exactly the reasons I suggested the Camm, thank you for explaining it better than I did.

The shorter range is why I referred to it as a point defense missile. I intended it as a compliment to the ESSM, as a way to increase the total number of missiles carried, not a replacement.

The Type 26 was included as an example of ship that is fitted with two different sized VLS systems to operate both missiles, not as the preferred contender for Anzac II.