The Nigerian Navy’s NNS Thunder F90
DAILY TRUST
Lagos
Wednesday, 20 June 2012
Royal Navy and French Navy warships arrived in Nigeria yesterday for joint maritime training exercises with the
personnel of the Nigerian Navy in order to enhance the security of the West
African Coast.
Whilst the Royal Navy came to port with HMS Dauntless, a destroyer , under the command of Captain Will Warrender, his French counterpart, Commander Bourhis Gwenegan sailed in L’Herminier, a frigate sailed into the country early this morning.
The Commanding Officers were escorted by their respective Defence Advisers, Colonel James Hugh and Colonel Marcelo Oliveira to the Headquarters Western Naval Command, Apapa Lagos.
During a courtesy call on the Flag Officer Commanding Western Naval Command, Rear Admiral Ameen Ikioda, both commanding officers said the partnership was to strengthen the control of the West African Coast against piracy and maritime domain criminality.
BRITISH GOVERNMENT PLEDGES SUPPORT FOR REGIONAL PEACE IN WEST AFRICA
PAN AFRICAN NEWS AGENCY
19 June, 2012
The British government has pledged its
continuous support to enhance maritime security and development within the West African region, so as to enhance peace, security and stability in the area, according to British High Commissioner to Nigeria, Andrew Lloyd.
“We want to support ECOWAS and its
member states as they seek to make
their cooperation more effective, but it
goes beyond maritime security, because
the objective of the average Nigerian,
Ghanaian or Senegalese is to prosper,’ Lloyd told journalists in Lagos during a
briefing aboard the British warship, HMS
Dauntless.
He said it was imperative for peace and
security within the sub-region to
guarantee a free flow of trade, business
and investments which will lead to desire development. The ship is the second of the six Type 45 destroyers which form part of the surface fleet in the modern Royal Navy.
It is designed to provide the fleets
primary defence against attacks from the air and it represents a step change in capability as the most advanced warship in the world.
HMS Dauntless left the United Kingdom in April on its first tour of Africa, after it
was built. It has visited Cape Verde,
Senegal, Ghana, Cote’dIvoire, before
berthing in Nigeria. It will later sail to South Africa, the Falkland Islands, the Caribbean through the Eastern Coastal states to the United States before returning to the United Kingdom in seven months time.
The ship is made up of five main
departments – warfare, logistics,
executive, weapons engineering and
marine engineering. The ship, which cost one billion pounds, took British builders two to three years to build and it is the most advanced Anti-Air
Warfare Vessel in the world.
During its stay in Nigeria, the crew will
organise training programmes and share working experience with the Nigerian Navy. According to the ship Captain, Will Warrender, “We have a fairly lengthened training programme over the next three days. We will have members of the Nigerian Navy coming on board to participate in the training programme. This will give them the opportunity to see in terms of boarding operations, sea safety, search and rescue and very wide spectrum of operations we are expected
to perform”.
The occasion was also used to launch the Great campaign that is utilising the
unprecedented global attention on Britain during 2012 to promote the country as a world–class destination for business, investment and tourism.
Britain is hosting the 2012 Olympics and
Paralympic games and the Queen’s
Diamond Jubilee, all of which have
attracted global attention to the country. Lloyd said London was ready to host the world, stressing that the Olympic games venues were completed on time and within budget.
He said the greatest challenge was how
to deal with the expectations of the
millions of visitors expected at the
games. The campaign is focused on areas such as: Trade and Investment, Innovation, entrepreneurship, creativity, technology, knowledge, green tourism, heritage, sports, shopping, music and countryside.
Really and i quess that will be in the gulf of guinea it is unfortunate we keep dining with devil with a short spoon.
oga benjy
The problem sometimes is not with the devil SOMETIMES IT IS WITH THE PERSON BEING TEMPTED. The thing to worry about is why people have more interests in our strategic INVESTMENTS THAN WE SOMETIMES DO
@benjy,that is the problem we have in Nigeria,our people will never learn their lesson.
No matter how advanced the Type 45 Anti-Air Warfare Destroyers (the HMS Dauntless inclusive) may be,they are still vulnerable to the Russian SU-30/35 Flanker fighter jet firing the Raduga kh-41 Moskit/SS-N-22 Sunburn or the NPO Mashinostroyenia Kh-61 Yakhont/Brahmos/SS-N-26 Stallion anti-ship missiles.
Abi na folo folo we like,NN make una forget ooo, dem no go teach una any important thing about modern naval warfare!
Allow world powers to come and do any exercise within our territorial waters is unacceptable,the ships they would be using have modern intelligence gathering equipments while our are having obsolate or none of these equipments.
Great Patriots, shebi una de code ba?
How do you know a type 45 is any more vulnerable to those anti ship missiles than any other. Do you think the designers didn’t know what they were designing the ship to counter?
Such CLASS, Such DISTINCTION.
I would have been happier if they were comming for proper Naval exercises in the form of “war games” involving Nigerian naval /aerial assets.
That is what HMS Dauntless will do when it goes to South-Africa, which has proper naval frigates (MEKO-200) and submarines. By now with a navy that is 56 years old, we should have passed the stage where these western naval powers send a warship to conduct “training sessions” for our naval personnel. That may be good for the navies of Benin, Togo, Ghana and Senegal (no offence to these countries) but certainly not for Nigeria.
Let our government please equip our Navy properly with good ocean going naval platforms so that our navy can conduct full-scale naval exercises with foreign naval warships in which our naval personel can see how they/their naval platforms will perform in a battle situation- as against their foreign counterparts. South Africa does it regularly with the German Navy- why can’t we?
@K’yall ,u are right, but I bet u these anglo/franco warships wouldn’t be that distinct, if they were in south africa or morocco.
As the moroccan french built FREMM destroyer is a match for the UK’s type 45 or whatever europe has to offer.
Nigeria just continues to disgrace her self, by being penny wise and pound foolish.
Also, I agree with @gbash10. Inspite of the advancement in stealth and electronic jamming made by the west in their latest destroyers, the brahmos, sunburns, yahkonts and other supersonic anti-ship missiles still present a significant threat to them.
So, by investing in these anti-ship missiles, along with their SU-30 mk2, the land locked navy less ugandans, has a more powerful say in the indian ocean than other sub saharan african nations.
And trust me, those in the know, are aware of this threat/capability.
PREACH MY BROTHER PREACH LET ME LISTEN AMEN.
@Peccavi,do you know that even the French Exocet that the Argentine used to destroy so many Royal Navy ships in the Falklands/Malvinas War were not as faster as the Moskit(travelling at 3 times the speed of the Exocet),that is, Mach2.2 velocity and a formidable size(7 times the size of the Exocet,with a mass of 4500kg including the warhead and the propellant),the same thing to the Yakhont which has a mass of 2500kg and a speed of Mach2.5 velocity.
While some of the exocet missiles got their target and destroy them, others could not explode due to failed fuse.In the case of the russian missiles,they carry the proximity-fuse now.
These are the type of weapons our country is suppose to acquire so that any would-be aggressor will think twice!
Bros do you think the ships designers don’t know this? Do you think they are just sailing around hoping for the best. There are multiple systems and tactics for dealing with anti ship missiles, a Type 45 has more survivability (properly handled) than most comparable warships.
@Peccavi’
Respects peccavi, but no matter how sophisticated the Aerial defence syatem of a warship is (be it Type 45 or the American Aegiss/Ticodongera) it will eventually fall before repeated onslaugh by anti ship missiles especially if its the Moskit/Sunburn or Yakhont UNLESS the ship itself has a formidable air umbrella (preferably land-based). Its just a matter of simple arithmetic/probability.
The trick is to know the total no of anti-aircraft missile on board and lauch twice their number or more and programme them to approach the target from different angles, elevation and direction.
If one anti-missile kills one missile ( i doubt if there is a missile that can kill two missiles not in close proximity to itself’ even the much talked about RBS 70 that discharges pellets into the flight path on incoming missile) then the others will penetrate. It will then be left for CIWS (Close-In weapon Sytems) like the Phallax or the Goalkeeper. Hence, a ship that has 20 antimissiles on board is dead if the enemy launches 40 hypersonic anti ship( of the Mosquito/Sunburn type) at it no matter how good the CIWS are. These missiles takes less than 3 minutes to reach their targets and they hug the waves!
That is why they move in Battle groups so as to “watch each others back”
Patriots, as per the joint training with Royal Navy? My comment is that Nigeria is not serious yet.
God bless Nigeria.
Again I don’t disagree but your speaking as if the designers and naval planners are unaware of this. They would not deploy in range of ASSM without air cover land or sea based. As modern warships go the Type 45 is up there for its class and size, in the old day it would have been a cruiser. ASSM can be defeated just like any other weapon system, it just depends on the tactics and counter measures of the ship being attacked. However ASSM are an exceptionally cost effective way to defend your coastline from hostile navies
Hmn, dunno about the Type 45 o but the C802(YJ82) AShM will probably “breakthrough” at the expense of this ship. The Israeli Sa’ar missile corvettes have already felt the heat.
C802
” Due to the Yingji-82 missile’s small radar reflectivity, low attack flight path (only five to seven meters above the sea
surface) and strong anti-jamming
capability of its guidance system, target
ships have a very small chance of
intercepting the missile. The single shot hit probability of the Yingji-82 is estimated to be as high as 98%.”
Ditto the beast that is the Yakhont.
http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/P-800_Oniks
Israel’s Barak v the evil YAKHONT
http://freerepublic.com/focus/f-bloggers/2750068/posts
Since we are not at war with Great britain or France then i dont consider them a threat, instead of we shift the blame to our misguilded government. Am so glad that these two great countries decides to grace our shore with their awesum war machines.
Great Patriot,the truth is that we can not trust either the Royal Navy or the French Navy.
You guys should not forget the key actors in the Bakassi Penninsula lost to Cameroun.
oga gbash
May be mr BEEGEAGLE WILL ONE DAY GO INTO DEPTH ( MILITAIRLY) ABOUT THE BAKSSI PENNISULA BUT THE FACTS OF THE CASE REGARDLESS OF WHO owns it now will stun you, believe it or not what did we do when we had it? do we have any less oil? what it stopped us from discovering the next offshore platform capable of 500,000b.p.d.
Bakassi being lost was not as important as the fact that all these years from ibb to abacha to obj it was not built up ( at least i give abacha credit for holding on to it ) but as far as naval build up there are things that should not be said on this blog
oh by the way it is consider a military honor regardless of the political isinuations when a country’s flag ship stops at your port
No ship is missile proof however let us not sell the British short they have long memories from the falklands campaign especially with regards to the EXOCET missiles I am willing to bet the anti- missile systems, anti- jamming devices WILL BE AMONGSTS THE BEST INTHE WORLD.
The bakassi penninsula was lost, for one reason and one reason alone. NIGERIA’S MILITARY WEAKNESS.
The french knew it, the cameroonians knew it, of course the UK knew it, and remember, they sold us out in the early days of the crises.
Though this was a colonial mistake made by germany and UK pre WW1 , the UK quickly claimed it belonged to cameroun, thereby, freeing the hand of the french and their imperial african machinations.
However, just as the civilian administrations of OBJ and GEJ refuses to strategically RE ARM in the face of BH & MEND, the military regimes of Abacha & IBB refused to equip the nigerian armed forces to intimidate cameroun and to DETER france.
So when president Obasanjo decided to turn his back on nigerian citizens in bakassi pennisula, nationalist sentiment in nigeria wasn’t his priority, winning accolades amongst foreign dignitaries was.
If nigeria had the 6 su-30mk2 jets the uganda invested in, or the 18 su-30ks that we have been imploring our govt. to by on sale from russia, the bakassi peninsula would have still been in nigerian hands.
This is because of the deterring effect these powerful jets would have on france. While nigeria cant even dream of defeating a world power like france, the cost of losing some of it’s prized warships would make their support for Paul Biya’s adventure, not worth her while.
But what do nigerian politicians care about recent history, when crafting present and future policies ?
They are accountable to no one, except their stomachs.
Our current armed forces in my opinion are sufficient to take back Bakassi opposed or unopposed. We should be able to take Anglophone Cameroun into the bargain. I love the way Nigerian politicians are quick to mollify foreigners but will use everything in thier power against thier own citizens. I dey laugh
Not with french warships stationed off shore, and french mirage 2000-5s or rafales stationed in chad, gabon or off the Charles de gaule nuclear powered aircraft carrier.
I did not want to state this on the blog because it cannot be verified since one of the principal actors is dead (abacha) .however it was alleged that “S.A.” wanted to conquer the entire pennisula a plan was drawn up and it was set to go into motion until the FRENCH notified S.A THAT THEY HAVE ACOPY OF THE SAME PLANS AGAIN LET ME STATE FOR THE RECORD THIS SPECULATION.
It is not a question of retaking Bakassi it is more a question of the people in power refusing to equip the armed forces to the level of pure intimidation that would give pause to any nation looking greedily at any of nigeria’s off-shore islands.
EVENTUALLY this cycle of ineptitude in leadership will END .We shall see how relevant Bakassi is when we have leaders who care. Can someone tell me how many b.p.d. the latest off shore platform by TOTAL (FRENCH) IS PRODUCING? AND WHAT HAVE THE CAMEROONIANS DONE WITH BAKASSI since they have acquired………. err stolen it from us .
There is more French money in Nigeria than there is in any other West African country bar Gabon. A Nigerian government with brains and balls will simply announce they are looking to nationalise a few French companies ‘in the national interest’ (with no mention of Bakassi) and the French will get the hint, they are ruthlessly pragmatic and value money over anything else
Patriots,
(1) Those navies are here not to spy ( they already know what GEJ ate last night) but to humor us.
(2) The only kind of exercise that will be done is the Man-Overboard type simply because NN cannot afford to “waste” even one Exocet missile. Target will be “designated” and they will be assumed “killed”. Schools will later be visited and ” conferences” and dinner party held.
(3) No ship (no matter how sophisticated the surveillance radars and the AAM are) is impregnable provided there is an ample supply of super/hypersonic Anti Ship missiles. Saturation attack will eventually take it out UNLESS it or it’s allies can take out the platforms from which the Anti Ships are being launched.
(4) Bakkasi was lost because a certain president ( just like all of them) prefers the praises of other world presidents to the interest of his own people. Remember OBJ wanted the position of UN sec Gen so badly (he still does) and he will sacrifice anything to be seen by the international community as a man of peace ( remember the coup in Sao Tome, the resolution of the Sudanese civil war in Abuja etc). We fdidnt loose Bakkassi because our military was I’ll equipped. We lost it due to an individual personal interest. If Bakkassi had been Otta, would we have lost it like that?
BRITISH, FRENCH NAVIES PARTNER NIGERIAN NAVY ON TRAINING
The Guardian
23 June,2012
TWO warships, the Royal and French naval warships have arrived Nigeria for joint maritime training and operations with the personnel of the Nigerian Navy.
The training, according to Naval
spokesman in Lagos, Lieutenant
Commander Jerry Omodara, would
enhance the security of the West African Coast.
The British navy popularly called the Royal Navy came into Nigerian port with HMS Dauntless, a destroyer, under the Command of Captain Will Warrender. His French counterpart, Commander Bourhis Gwenegan sailed into Lagos with L’Herminier, a frigate.
The Commanding officers of the two ships were escorted to the headquarters of the Western Naval Command, Apapa, Lagos by their respective countries’ Defence Advisers in Nigeria, Colonel James Hugh and Colonel Marcelo Oliveira.
During a courtesy visit to the Flag Officer Commanding (FOC) Western Naval Command, Rear Admiral Ameen Ikioda,both Commanding Officers noted that the partnership was to strengthen the control of West Africa Coast against piracy and sea criminality.
Commanding Officers of the ships were
received by the FOC and his management team including the Chief Staff Officer(CSO) Commodore Adebowale Dacosta, Command Operations Officer(COO) Commodore Henry Babalola, Fleet Commander, Western Naval Command,Commodore Livinus Iwuoha and CaptainSaheed Akinwande, among others.
Speaking during the courtesy visit, the
Commanding Officer of Royal Navy Ship
HMS Dauntless Captain Warrender, said
the collaboration is a timely venture that would see the participating countries pool their resources to ensure that the maritime domain of West Africa is free from criminality, thereby boosting economic activities.
Warrender added that while in the
country, they would be conducting joint
training operations towards developing capacity in maritime operation. “It is an absolute honour to come to Nigeria, the first of our visit since the commissioning of HMS Dauntless two years ago. The HMS Dauntless is one of the most advanced destroyers in the world today. The ship left the United Kingdom in March and will head back in October after the conclusion of this joint collaboration with Nigeria and some other West African countries,” he said.
His French counterpart, Colonel Gwenegan, acknowledged the great work the Nigerian Navy was doing on the waterways, especially on the Gulf of Guinea where constant patrol of different Navy platforms have reduced piracy to a reasonable extent.
He said: “It is a major thing that the
Nigerian Navy has achieved in this region so it is important that we work together to enhance the security of the
waterways.”
In his response, the FOC Western Naval
Command, Rear Admiral Ikioda, also
applauded the ships and their crew.