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Displaying items by tag: Gov order another ship

#GovOrderOPV - Paul Kehoe, Junior Defence Minsiter has secured Government approval to purchase another OPV vessel for the Naval Service.

This ensures that the service will continue to have at least eight ships while at the same time replacing older vessels.

Mr Kehoe told the Irish Independent last night that the Government had agreed to provide €54.3m ( €66.8m after VAT) the purchase an additional ship after reaching a contract agreement with Babcock International to build it at their headquarters in Appledore, Devon.

He said: "This is a major benefit to the State and will be a further significant enhancement of defence capability. "The acquisition of a fourth sister ship of the same class as those recently commissioned will secure crewing, training, logistical and maintenance advantages", he added.

The new ship will be delivered within two years and its purchase is in line with the maritime capability requirements set out in the government white paper on defence last year.

For more The Independent has a report here.

Published in Navy

William M Nixon has been writing about sailing in Ireland and internationally for many years, with his work appearing in leading sailing publications on both sides of the Atlantic. He has been a regular sailing columnist for four decades with national newspapers in Dublin, and has had several sailing books published in Ireland, the UK, and the US. An active sailor, he has owned a number of boats ranging from a Mirror dinghy to a Contessa 35 cruiser-racer, and has been directly involved in building and campaigning two offshore racers. His cruising experience ranges from Iceland to Spain as well as the Caribbean and the Mediterranean, and he has raced three times in both the Fastnet and Round Ireland Races, in addition to sailing on two round Ireland records. A member for ten years of the Council of the Irish Yachting Association (now the Irish Sailing Association), he has been writing for, and at times editing, Ireland's national sailing magazine since its earliest version more than forty years ago