
Sri Lanka Navy commissions former PLAN frigate
The Type 053H2G-class frigate taken over from the People’s Liberation Army Navy (PLAN) to increase the operational capabilities of the Sri Lanka Navy arrived at the port of Colombo on July 8th 2019.

The Type 053H2G-class frigate taken over from the People’s Liberation Army Navy (PLAN) to increase the operational capabilities of the Sri Lanka Navy arrived at the port of Colombo on July 8th 2019.

According to local media, the Russian Navy started to experiment the use of UUVs and USVs from its Project 22350 Admiral Gorshkov-class frigate. UAVs are set to be tested from Russia’s latest generation of frigates as well.

Here is NavalNews.com’s fifth monthly report (June 2019). Naval News Monthly Reports are video round ups of the most read naval defense news articles we published in the past month.

Naval Group is set to begin construction on the Defense and Intervention Frigate (FDI) with a first steel cutting ceremony expected to take place in mid-October at the shipyard in Lorient. The FDI is the next generation of surface combatant for the French Navy.

Babcock International, the Aerospace and Defence company, has successfully completed Factory Acceptance Testing (FAT) of the Air Weapons Handling System (AWHS) for the Type 26 Global Combat Ship, designed for BAE Systems.

Naval Group hosted the French Minister for the Armed Forces, Florence Parly, to celebrate the end of work on the sixth and final ASW variant multi-mission frigates “Normandie”. The event was also a celebration for the beginning of the manufacturing of the FREMM frigates with reinforced air defense capabilities (FREMM DA) and of the Defense and Intervention Frigate (FDI), the first fully digital warships.

South Korea’s Daewoo Shipbuilding & Marine Engineering (DSME) launched ROKS Gyeongnam, the second Daegu-class FFX Batch II frigate for the Republic of Korea Navy (RoK Navy). The event took place on June 21st in presence of the RoK Navy Chief of Naval Operations Admiral Sim Seung-seob.

Norway has officially decided to scrap its F313 frigate KNM « Helge Instad » instead of repairing her, the Norwegian government confirmed on June, 21.

The General Director of the GDDIA (the Hellenic defense procurement agency) Vice Admiral (ret.) Kyriakos Kyriakidis, visited Naval Group’s headquarters on the sidelines of the Paris Air Show. The meeting took place just weeks after GDDIA submitted an LOI to France in connection with the procurement of two Belharra frigates from Naval Group by the Hellenic Navy.

The U.S. Navy released a request for proposals (RFP) for the guided missile frigate FFG(X) detail design and construction (DD&C) contract for the first 10 ships (one base ship and nine option ships), the PEO Unmanned and Small Combatants announced on June 20.