Catamarans and Trimarans in Service.

don’t know if this has been reported yet but the ‘streetfighter’ HSV2 is in portsmouth these days. she’s on attachment with the UK MCM force for trials as a command ship for MCM ops around Norway i think. never been so surprised to see a foreign vessel in portsmouth as i was when i saw her from across the bay.

What about the ship used in Tomorrow Never Dies, which class and who uses it?

That was supposedly Sea Shaddow and she is used by the Department of defence, (not the USN), But if you look at the way the ship is protrayed in the movie, she is a much larger vessel. It’s just Hollywood being creative yet again.

What about the ship used in Tomorrow Never Dies, which class and who uses it? Thanks 🙂

Don’t forget the United States Navy’s Pigeon class submarine rescue ships, which were catamarans which could carry the USN’s Mystic class DSRVs slung between the hulls.

(she is ugly 😉 )

Nope, Israeli subs are too large allready. Most sources say Kommuna has 4 250 ton winches, which would mean she could just lift a Whiskey, but nothing larger than that. However I do not know whether 250t is the Safe Working Load of these winches, or the real maximum at which they tested it. She would be particularily useful for countries like North Korea, Croatia, Iran, etc. operating much smaller subs. Poland would also be happy with it as the Kobben, I think, is small and light enough to be pulled up by Kommuna’s winches.
Another note is of course that current winches and cables are much much stronger than they used to be and with a refit I think Kommuna would be capable of lifting bigger subs too (depending on the strength of the structure). (Considering her age, this is doubtful too).

Dont claim Kommuna as ugly! 😡 She’s one beutifull, old girl…rememberting that Nikolai II was the ruler of hers home country when she was launched…hats of the the Russians of keeping it afloat so long

Mate would it have a use with countries like Poland and Israel who still use small subs do you think? DSRV is a great idea but usually the DSRV’s are not the ones in trouble 😉

She was built to lift older submarines in distress out of the water. Like Wiskey and others. Now she’s too small (length of only 96m although she looks much larger than that due to her broad beam) and too weak to lift current subs out of the water so she was rebuilt for DSRV carriage.
So, yes she was indeed built as a catamaran to be able to carry out her task. She was built by Schelde in Flushing! I think the design is quite genious. The large cage structures are very low on weight, but still preserve the strength of the structure. The bridge on top gives a good horizon and operations control station too!

Ugly, but practical!

Neptune: Mate judging by the framework, Kommuna actually lifted the sub out of the water between the hulls, hence needing to be a cat design, am I right?

You are right however, it is ugly!

B*ttugly Kommuna submarine rescue vehicle/salvage ship:

PLAN ships.

Street Fighter up the top there is actually the former RAN vessel HMAS Jervis Bay ARK-45

We also had two Bay class Inshore Mine Hunters as mentioned above:

HMAS Rushcutter (MHI-80)

HMAS Shoalwater (MHI-81)

These ships differed slightly in their design and their mission packages were stored in containers on the upper aft deck, at the time (early 80’s) they used the latest in mine hunting remote robotics, sadly this proved unreliable and with the ships being top heavy they weren’t good in rough swells. They have now both been retired and sold off to private industry (both becoming passenger ferries).

I was reading an old book “Australia’s Armed Forces of the Eighties” and in it it has a spiel about these vessels including the reserved names and numbers should the project have proven a positive one, they were going to be; Westernport MHI-03, Discovery MHI-04, Esperance MHI-05 and Melville MHI-06

re:

No known pic of North Korean Soho class exists. I don’t think the militaries are too keen on releasing their photos, so unless the ship ventures out a bit into international waters and an Orion snaps a photo of it, I don’t think we’ll be seeing it.

South Korea operates a catamaren test ship for ADD and Navy. They were trial ships for the TASS and rocket decoy system.

Distiller, HSV1 & 2 I believe are Incat Catamarans, made in Tasmania. Similar to HMAS Jervis Bay which saw service in East Timor but has returned to commercial work.

Plus there are the immensely powerful Impeccable and Victorious class SURTASS ships the USN operate.

picture credit: Hazegray.org

Plus the Japanese twins of those vessels – the Hibiki Class

picture credit: Japanese Govt

Technically SWATH ships as opposed to Catamarans but still multihulls and very, very powerful units at that!.

I believe you very much, it is the same… US has bought some commercial craft for testing the effectiveness of them in military use. I don’t know what the results of the tests have been though.

That “Streetfighter” USN project above is nearly exactly the same as the Super Seacat ferry that does runs between Belfast and Scotland. The terminal is 3 miles from my house in Belfast and I swear thats exactly the same boat with a new coat of paint.

http://www.navy.gov.au/fleet/survey.htm
Royal Australian Navy survey vessels.
I think they operated catarmaran mine warfare ships too.

North Korea has had a catameran in service for a while. Anyone have pics of that ship? According to Haze Gray it is armed with “2 SS-N-2 Styx SSM, 1 100mm/56 DP, 1 dual 37 mm AA, 2 dual 25 mm AA, 2 RBU-1200 ASW rocket launchers, DC racks” and has not been “a success.”

And of course the new Chinese FAC…