Construction begins on Australia’s 3rd Arafura-class OPV

Australia's Continuous Naval Shipbuilding Program has reached a new milestone with construction on the first Offshore Patrol Vessel (OPV) to be built in Western Australia commencing.

Nathan Gain 27 Mar 2020

This will be the third of twelve Arafura class OPVs, and the first to be built at the Civmec Construction & Engineering shipyard in Henderson, Western Australia.

Minister for Defence, Senator the Hon Linda Reynolds CSC said:

“Today’s milestone reinforces the OPV program is on schedule to deliver the capability for the Royal Australian Navy when the first ship commences service in 2022.“

The first two vessels are already under construction by Luerssen Australia and ASC Pty Ltd in Adelaide.

The remaining ten vessels will be constructed by Luerssen Australia and Civmec at Henderson in Western Australia under the SEA1180 OPV program.

Luerssen Australia is the Prime Contractor working with key shipbuilding partners Civmec in Western Australia and ASC OPV Shipbuilder in South Australia to deliver the OPV capability for the Royal Australian Navy.

Our coverage of the SEA1180 OPV program during PACIFIC 2019

Authors

Posted by : Nathan Gain

Nathan is based in Namur, Belgium. He holds an MA in modern history with a minor in international relations from the Catholic University of Louvain (UCL – Belgium). Fascinated by military history he naturally turned to the defense sector after graduating and is particularly interested in Northern European and Belgian defense issues as well as in anything related to naval aviation.