Displaying items by tag: Naval Visitor

6th November 2012

Former ‘Privately’ Owned Offshore Patrol Vessel Visits Dublin Port

#NAVAL VISIT- Having visited Cork last month, The Royal Navy's River class offshore patrol vessel OPV HMS Mersey (P283) is currently moored in Dublin Port, the ship belongs to a trio of sisterships purchased in a £39m deal, writes Jehan Ashmore.

HMS Mersey along with OPV's Severn and Tyne have for nearly the last decade served the Fishery Protection Squadron while on 'loan' to the Royal Navy. They had operated on a rolling five-year term lease from the shipbuilder-owners, Vosper Thornycroft, now part of BAE Systems.

The lease was due to be renewed in 2013 but rather than face having to pay more to rent the trio of vessels for £7m a year, the UK government signed the contract to buy the ships outright, keeping them in service with the Royal Navy for the next ten years.

The Portsmouth based OPV's known as the 'Cod' squadron are hard-working vessels, where each vessel conducts fishery patrol duties for 275 days annually. In addition they are assigned to perform tasks such as maritime security, counter terrorism, tackling smuggling, fire-fighting and SAR missions.

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New York Yacht Club’s biennial Invitational Cup

Ireland has a proud history in New York Yacht Club’s biennial Invitational Cup, with Irish participation from the very start and a podium result in 2019.

In 2009, two Irish Clubs, Royal St. George in Dun Laoghaire and Royal Cork in Crosshaven, entered into New York's newest sailing competition that was reminiscent of Newport’s America’s Cup days when 19 yacht club teams from 14 nations descended on this “City by the Sea”.

The Rolex New York Yacht Club Invitational Cup is a competition between yacht clubs, with strict eligibility rules ensuring that each team is comprised exclusively of amateur sailors.

The competition, which was first run in 2009, has drawn entries from 49 clubs from 22 nations on all six inhabited continents.

The New York Yacht Club won the inaugural event in 2009, with the Royal Canadian Yacht Club winning in 2011 and 2013, England's Royal Thames Yacht Club winning in 2015 and Southern Yacht Club from New Orleans winning in 2017.

In 2019 the regatta was sailed for the first time in the New York Yacht Club’s fleet of IC37 yachts, and Royal Sydney Yacht Squadron, from Australia, became the first Southern Hemisphere club to win the trophy. And it was in this edition that Anthony O’Leary’s Royal Cork team took the bronze medal.