According to information published by the UK MoD on March 20, 2023, patrol ship HMS Tamar was incorporated within the Jeanne d’Arc task group – the French Navy’s premier deployment of 2023 – working alongside ships and personnel from Australia, Canada, Japan, India, and the USA for Exercise Laperouse, a multinational exercise in the Bay of Bengal.
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River class Offshore Patrol Vessel HMS Tamar. (Picture source: UK MoD)
Tamar, which has most recently been operating around the British Indian Ocean Territory, joined the French – frigate FS La Fayette and assault ship Dixmude – off Sri Lanka for a series of combined manoeuvres (gunnery, close approaches, choreographed movements), while sailors traded places with their counterparts for a brief experience of life in their respective navies.
The main exercise – named after French naval officer and explorer Jean-François de Galaup compte de Laperouse – tested both the individual and combined abilities of the seven warships taking part, sharpening the skills of personnel, and honing their abilities to work side-by-side with colleagues of different nationalities, often speaking different languages.
It saw participants split into three naval groups with the British vessel taking her place alongside the Dixmude and Japanese destroyer JS Suzutsuki.
After practising replenishing at sea – the difficult but vital manoeuvre of transferring supplies between ships on the move – the French assault ship dropped a series of targets into the Indian Ocean for participants to engage with gunnery.
HMS Tamar destroyed both her own targets as well as any left over by; bringing the gunnery to a successful conclusion.
Next up: air defence, with the Dixmude and Suzutsuki charged with protecting Tamar from ‘enemy’ air attack before the three small task groups linked up for combined close manoeuvres.
Tamar has now resumed her Indian Ocean patrol on the latest leg of her five-year deployment with her sister ship HMS Spey to reinvigorate the UK and Royal Navy’s presence in the Indo-Pacific region – a commitment reaffirmed this week in the Integrated Review Refresh.
HMS Tamar
She has a displacement of 2,000 metric tons (2,000 long tons), a length of 90.5 meters (296 feet 11 inches), a beam of 13 meters (42 feet 8 inches), and a draft of 3.8 meters (12 feet 6 inches).
Her maximum speed is 25 knots (46 kilometers per hour; 29 miles per hour) and it has a range of 5,500 nautical miles (10,200 kilometers; 6,300 miles). The ship has an endurance of 35 days and can carry up to 50 troops. The crew size ranges from 34 to 45 members.
The Batch 2 River-class patrol vessel is armed with one 30 mm DS30B gun, four general-purpose machine guns, and two miniguns. It can carry two PAC24 Mk4 Sea Boats and has a Merlin-capable flight deck for aircraft operations.
