John Newman
The Bunker Group
If you look at the various OPV designs that are currently available in the 80m-100m range, most appear to have some sort of aviation capability, from just a flight deck, right up to a flight deck, refuelling facilities and a hangar too.Acknowledging the enhanced capabilities and mission flexibility that a helo brings and given that an MRH90 would be embarked on as needed basis and not organic to the vessel, I'm interested to learn what design and cost implications a helo flight deck has on OPV design and build.
Also, is a hangar desirable/necessary for the OPVs?
As we know very little of what capabilities and specs are sought in the OPVs, I do wonder if omission of a helo flight deck and/or hangar might be a candidate cost-cutting measure for a cash-strapped Defence budget.
If a chosen design had all of those inherent aviation capabilities in its 'basic' design (for example the 83m Damen OPV 1800 that I mentioned last page), it would probably 'cost' just as much to delete said capabilities, whatever is 'saved' in material costs by not building a flight deck and hangar will probably be counterbalanced by the redesign costs to remove said capability.
So what would be the point of that??