OCEA-built 24 metre Coastal Patrol Craft of the Nigerian Navy in France
Special thanks to DONSPONY for spotting this photograph. Priceless!
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Meta
Beegagle,
The pirates have tampered with the hornet’s net and they will son see and experience he fury and the venom of its sting. you dont fight a guy that is economically/financially stronger than you (ask Japan and the Nazis what they experience after attacking the USA in WWII). all he needs to do is convert his economic muscles to miliatary use.
The giant is finally awake, and the pirates and saboteurs that are stealing our oil (we loose $5Billion/annum) and the overfish our EEZ (this loss cannot be quatified yet) will soon see and experience its fury.
Priority is to pile platforms up in their numbers. The threat is low tech and low level but the AOP is big. In order to fight such threats we need “presence”. We (i.e NN) must be able to “loiter” for days and “respond” quickly using an array of FACs and manned/unmanned airbourne assets like helicopters and dronnes.
The cost of acquisition of these platforms is insignificant compared to the losses we incur annually by not having them.
I think the era of having more rear-Admirals than ships will soon be over.
Lets keep pilling them up and lets not forget to acquire the technology too.
Any country that is not willing to transfer, we should not do biz with.
Go Nigerian Navy go.
You seem to have more faith than I. The problem is not the lack of ability or capability to tackle the pirates and saboteurs, its the political will to prosecute those at the top benefiting from it
More from the same source as Donspony: http://www.meretmarine.com/article.cfm?id=119057
Google translation (lightly edited):
“The first of three patrol boats ordered from Ocea by Nigeria sailed from St. Nazaire Tuesday to conduct sea trials. The picture below taken in late February shows her afloat in the basin of Penhoet. P 175, which bears no name, measures 24 meters long and will have light artillery. Her first sister ship, which carries the hull number P 176, has meanwhile been launched; the third series unit is under construction.”
I wish there was a better overhead or view of the Starboard side, I can’t quite make out what’s going on with the boat(?) handling gear on that side. It may be an A-Frame, or a knuckle boom crane.
@Spirit. We are on the same page, mate. We hope it all comes together and that the procurement begins and never ceases. That is the way the Egyptians and Algerians do it. We can learn from our peers – not buy and foolishly shut down for 21 years which was what we did after acquiring MCMVs in 1988. Nothing else until two Sea Eagle OPCs were acquired in 2009. If that does not amount to the subversion of a national institution, what does?
OOOH! I just discovered a way to access a large version of the picture of P175!
http://www.meretmarine.com/objets/42604.jpg
The builders yard is on the Bay of Biscay http://g.co/maps/nw6vw. The “light artillery”, not yet mounted, cannot be very big from the size of the stand on the foredeck, 25mm perhaps?
Great translation solution, Rastus. Was quite appalled by the fact that there was no English language mode on that useful website. Typically French ultranationalism.
The gear which you see at the side could be for two things – to drop an embarked RHIB or lift a water storage tank onto the platform. Seen similar stuff on some NN ships. This little ship, like the Shaldags and the six refurbished CPCs which are being expected(details still so sketchy) are probably going to be the lead ships in the six new coastal Forward Operating Bases – Badagry, Igbokoda, Escravos, Formoso, Bonny and Ibaka plus the new naval base NNS Jubilee at Ikot Abasi.
Possibly, the Suncraft Group’s gyro-stabilzed 20mm RALCO remotely-controlled Naval Weapon Station would be mounted on these craft.
please clarify something IS NNS jubilee @ IKOT ABASI going to be a full fledged NAVAL BASE
OR something of upgrade between F.O.B. AND a FULL NAVAL station
Beeg a couple of questions for you: (1) the new naval base NNS Jubilee in Ikot Abasi Akwa Ibom State -a natural deep water harbour – is that going to be the home of our future submarine fleet?
(2) we have a naval air station in Ojo – lagos state (Western Naval Command) and a nascent air station in Warri Delta State (I presume for Central Naval Command) – do we have any naval air station for the Eastern Naval Command? (3) Does the Nigerian Army still have an airborne brigade (paratroopers)?
@Yagz+Jimmy. Sorry about the delayed response. Yes, Ikot Abasi is a full-fledged naval base NNS Jubilee – not a FOB.
The known strategic importance is that the billion-dollar RUSAL(Russian Aluminium) Smelter is there and it appears as if the NPA are also developing a new deepwater port within that general area.
True, Ikot Abasi boasts the deepest harbour around us and the flip side to the existence of the all-new NNS Jubilee could be that at some point, it turns out to be a submarine, possibly within the next five years. It is clear that the articulated 10-year Plan of the Nigerian Navy for 2010-2020 makes provisions for the acquisition of light frigates, LPDs, OPVs and submarines.
Yes, everything points to the fact that the Naval Air Station being developed at Effurun near Warri is intended to support the operations of Central Command while the construction of the Calabar Naval Air Station is SURE to be carried through to fruition before end-2013 as well.
Concerning the Airborne Brigade, the 82 Division during the 1980s and 1990s had the following brigade-sized formations under command;
82 Division HQ Garrison
31 Airborne Brigade
13 Amphibious Brigade
2 Air Mobile Brigade
34 Field Artillery Brigade
44 Division Engineers
The Niger Delta insurgency saw the scaling down of multi-facted infantry operations in deference to core amphibious operations. 31 Airborne Brigade which used to be stationed at Makurdi has since been redesignated as an artillery brigade, leaving only the 72 Paratroop Bn(which gave birth to the Special Forces Bn, interchangeable known as 72 Para Bn). I say this in the knowledge that today we have a 31 Field Artillery Brigade in Minna(1 Div AOR).
By the same token, Colonel Lawan Gwadabbe’s 15 Mechanised Brigade as it was as of 1995 has since become the 23 Armoured Brigade following the delivery of over 250 Scorpion, Vickers Eagle, AMX, T55 and T72 tanks after 1999 – most of these unfulfilled orders which had previously been held up by pre-2000 sanctions.
Moving on, 2 Air Mobile Brigade became 2 Amphibious Brigade, leaving us with two amphibious brigades in total.
For a time, we had 82 Div with the following formations
82 Division HQ Garrison
13 Amphibious Brigade
2 Amphibious Brigade
34 Field Artillery Brigade
44 Division Engineers
Last year, a sixth formation – 14 Infantry Brigade, was created within 82 Div AOR with four battalion-sized formations under command
- Bde HQ Garrison at Ohafia
- Infantry Bn at Omuma(in Rivers State but much closer to Aba)
- Infantry Bn at Akwa Ibom State
- Artillery Regiment in Ebonyi State
That is the state of play as we speak.
Great Stuff love the long term implicarions for the IKOT ABASI (NN JUBILEE).
Thank you for the updates.
correct