If Austal is the sole builder, no doubt those lots north end up as the future yard, not really a lot of space for a large frigate build… The other lots throughout the precinct have already been sold off or reserved for relocation of other builders.
Mighty close to the public boat ramp…
All those builds going to austal overlap on the timeline, my assumption is when silveryachts moves, a new hall will be built in its place and that’s where the fit out will happen for the the frigates. North of austal or civmec, potentially landing craft medium/heavy and LOSVs. Capes in the current shed.
The first landing craft medium is expected to be delivered in 2026, a new shipyard will take many years to build.
Nothing has really changed from the plan layed out in 2020.
Screenshot of the planned precinct.
The government committed to releasing an updated ship building plan later this year, which should answer a lot of where, what and when questions. I would hope it also provides clearer guidance on the plan for the Henderson facility. At the moment congested, unsecure and messy comes to mind. Additionally the government are playing their cards very close to their chest.
Stirling is too small for the future RAN fleet size, plus future USN needs, so it makes sense to move all maintenance (docking and alongside) to the Henderson precinct. This frees up Stirling for ships either visiting, preparing for deployment or in R&R.
Henderson Defence areas are however all mixed in with commercial areas, and it doesn't make for easy security. I think this is already a problem with the existing Henderson Naval presence, but will be a substantial requirement when the SSNs arrive. At the moment its not clear to me how this will be enforced, particularly for SSN drydock maintenance. Stirling requires a security upgrade for the SSNs, and its an order of magnitude better than Henderson.
I would have thought BAE upgrades their synchrolift to take Hunters so all surface ship docking work goes through them. Likewise berths 1, 2 and 3 plus the future 7 and 8 (proposed finger pier) get consolidated and become exclusive for Naval surface ship maintenance. A lot more shore facilities (workshops and offices) would be needed to enable this and I think the common user space to the east (where the big movable shed is) would need to be reclaimed for defence only. This way BAE and the RAN have adjacent plots and it becomes a dedicated Defence area with no common user components, big fences and guard dogs.
The northern common user area (north of Echo Marine), the common user area infront of Civmec (the big laydown pad), plus wharfs 5 and 6 (the two southern ones) could be redeveloped for commercial purposes.
Silver yachts, being Chinese owned would need to move, and there is a plan for them to relocate to one of the northern common user lots. Mind you I haven't heard anything on this for a while and it is no longer listed on Development WA's website. ASC would need some space to concurrently maintain Colins and SSNs, so perhaps they get the Silverlake area.
I don't like where the proposed drydock is going in front of Civmec and right at the entrance to the precinct. I cannot see how that could be secured for SSN maintenance. I would view this would be better located where the existing floating dock is, and the floating dock moved to the south as part of wharf 5 and 6. That gives Defence berth 4 plus the all land infront of ASC. This then nicely buts up to the above RAN and BAE areas, and they can share guard dogs.
With this plan, Defence has the area from the north end of BAE through to the south side of ASC as exclusive for Naval ship and submarine maintenance.
Lastly that leaves Austal and future ship building. My view is that the vacant lots to Austal's north make sense. Small Naval vessels can continue to be made in Austal's existing sheds (patrol boats and landing craft medium), with larger vessels (GPFs and landing craft heavy) in new larger sheds on the vacant land. LOCSVs could be made in either, depending on the eventual size. Austal will need to have some slipping or lifting capacity as well, as it is a long way down to the BAE synchrolift to launch a new big ship.
There is an option for Austal to build these new facilities themselves (similar to their US yard investment plan), or the government builds it and leases it back for projects (much like Osborne In SA).
The heavy landing craft start in 2028 on the current schedule, so they will need a facility in time for these builds. It should then roll straight into a GPF build from the early 30's. You are right Reptilia, there is a good chance these may overlap. Need a bigger shed.
Again I could be wrong and I have no inside knowledge, but there is a lot of money allocated to the FBW and Henderson redevelopment ($8 billion), and that does buy a lot of stuff. It also aligns with the government's acknowledgement that Defence needs to be consolidated in Henderson.
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