Military Vessels News

Norwegian shipbuilder Vard, a subsidiary of the Fincantieri Group, has presented the next generation of military vessels - the VARD Resilience series.To answer the Norwegian Navy’s demands for the new vessels, VARD has developed VARD Resilience series with a design that meets the request for standardization, modularization, adaptation to the customer's needs and purpose of the vessel.According to Vard, the Resielince series has been designed with a long service life in mind.“One…

Ukraine destroyed a Russian landing warship off the coast of occupied Crimea in an operation with naval drones that breached the vessel's port side on Wednesday and caused it to sink, Kyiv's military spy agency and armed forces said.There was no immediate comment from Russia, which said earlier that it had destroyed six drones in the Black Sea. The Kremlin declined to comment."The Ukrainian Armed Forces, together with the Defense Ministry's intelligence unit, destroyed the Tsezar Kunikov large landing ship.

Russia said on Saturday it had repelled an attempted Ukrainian drone attack on Russian "civilian transport ships" on Friday evening in the southwestern part of the Black Sea, a key artery for grain and oil exports from both countries.Civilian vessels on the Black Sea have not generally been targeted since Moscow ordered its troops into Ukraine in February 2022, but last July both sides said they would start treating ships headed to the other's ports as potential carriers of military cargo.In a statement posted on the Telegram messaging app…

Sweden on Wednesday dropped its investigation into the explosions in 2022 on Nord Stream pipelines carrying Russian gas to Germany, saying it lacked jurisdiction in the case but had handed evidence it had uncovered over to German investigators.The multi-billion-dollar Nord Stream 1 and 2 pipelines transporting gas under the Baltic Sea were ruptured by a series of blasts in the Swedish and Danish economic zones in September 2022, releasing vast amounts of methane into the air.Russia and the West…

When people hear about underwater reefs, they usually picture colorful gardens created from coral. But some reefs are anchored to much more unusual foundations.For more than a century, people have placed a wide assortment of objects on the seafloor off the U.S. coast to provide habitat for marine life and recreational opportunities for fishing and diving. Artificial reefs have been created from decommissioned ships, chicken transport cages, concrete pipes, rail cars and more.We study how ocean-dwelling fish use artificial reefs in the U.S. and beyond.

Analysts and commentators are quick to point out that fossil fuels will power maritime equipment, and indeed dominate the fueling marketplace, well into the future. However, they will do so alongside new fuels, and new technologies, that will be introduced to the maritime sector in the coming years. In its September, 2023 report “Beyond the Horizon: View of the Emerging Energy Value Chains”, the American Bureau of Shipping (ABS) explains that, “During the recent 80th meeting of the Marine Environment Protection Committee (MEPC 80)…

U.S. President Joe Biden hoped to present a firm international response to Yemen's Houthi attacks on Red Sea shipping by launching a new maritime force, but a week after its launch many allies don't want to be associated with it, publicly, or at all.Two of America's European allies who were listed as contributors to Operation Prosperity Guardian - Italy and Spain - issued statements appearing to distance themselves from the maritime force.The Pentagon says the force is a defensive…

Dutch shipbuilder Damen Shipyards has sued the Dutch government over damages it says it has suffered due to European sanctions against Russia.Damen, which produces a wide-ranging fleet of industrial and military vessels and luxury yachts, is seeking compensation for business lost due to the sanctions, company spokesman Rick van de Weg said, confirming an earlier report by Bloomberg.Damen had delivery contracts for a number of vessels across the company's portfolio that were scrapped by the sanctions invoked by Russia's invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, Van de Weg said.Damen had an engineer

KVH Industries, Inc. (Nasdaq: KVHI), announced the completion of a three-year renewal of its satellite services contract with Intelsat. The renewal includes increased network capacity, the flexibility to support future bandwidth adjustments, and reduced service costs.“We are thrilled to extend our long-standing relationship with Intelsat, which began in 2017 when KVH proudly became the launch partner for Intelsat’s FlexMaritime network,” said Brent Bruun, KVH’s President and Chief Executive Officer. “More than 7,100 commercial, leisure, and military vessels worldwide rely on KVH and Intelsat’s FlexMaritime high-throughput satellites (HTS) to deliver connectivity, content, cybersecurity, and additional critical services.

Ukraine on Monday condemned what it called "provocative" Russian actions and called for decisive countermeasures by the international community, a day after Moscow said one of its warships fired warning shots at a cargo vessel in the Black Sea.Moscow said on Sunday that its Vasily Bykov patrol ship fired automatic weapons on the Palau-flagged Sukru Okan vessel after the ship's captain failed to respond to a request to halt for an inspection.Russia has said it would treat any ships…

A Russian warship on Sunday fired warning shots at a cargo ship in the southwestern Black Sea as it made its way northwards, the first time Russia has fired on merchant shipping beyond Ukraine since exiting a landmark UN-brokered grain deal last month.In July, Russia halted participation in the Black Sea grain deal that allowed Ukraine to export agricultural produce via the Black Sea. Moscow said that it deemed all ships heading to Ukrainian waters to be potentially carrying weapons.On Sunday, Russia said in a statement that its Vasily Bykov patrol ship had fired automatic weapons on the Palau-flagged Sukru Okan vessel after the ship's captain failed to respond to a request to halt for an inspection.Russia said the vessel was making its way toward the Ukrainian port of Izmail.

A Kremlin aide urged the Russian government on Thursday to adopt legislation allowing foreign-flagged vessels to use the Northern Sea Route (NSR), which Moscow wants to turn into a new Suez Canal.The NSR runs from Murmansk near Russia's border with Norway eastwards to the Bering Strait near Alaska.Although the route is physically challenging, it could cut sea transport times between Europe and Asia at a time when Russia's trade with Western countries is at post-Cold War lows following Moscow's decision to send troops into Ukraine."We have been left without transit routes.

Uncrewed surface vessels (USVs), automated vessels, maritime autonomous surface ships (MASS), remote controlled vessels, and the employment of artificial intelligence and smart marine technology to navigate and operate civilian and military vessels have created a lively debate over utilizing and regulating such technology. Recent articles addressing artificial intelligence (AI) have questioned the value of experience and intuition versus computed logic based upon data and logarithmic differentiations.

The United States in recent weeks has been tracking what is believed to be a Russian military spy ship off the coast of the Hawaiian Islands.The U.S. Coast Guard said in an update on Thursday that it has been keeping tabs on the vessel, a suspected "intelligence gathering ship", for several weeks. Video footage released by the agency showed the ship in waters off the Hawaiian coast on January 11.The ship has been identified as the Kareliya (SSV-535), a Vishnya-class intelligence ship used by the Russian Navy for signals intelligence gathering.

Having recently reopened its Guam office after a three-year hiatus using a partner agent, Inchcape Shipping Services resumed direct control over all operational matters on the Pacific island.Inchcape had a permanent presence in Guam since the 1990s but opted to close its office on the Pacific island in 2018. “Given the volume of business in Guam at that time, it made better financial sense to use a partner agent instead. However, the uptick in volumes after the pandemic justified the move to reopen.

A U.S. aircraft carrier arrived in South Korea on Friday for the first time in about four years, set to join other military vessels in a show of force intended to send a message to North Korea.USS Ronald Reagan and ships from its accompanying strike group docked at a naval base in the southern port city of Busan ahead of joint drills with South Korean forces.Its arrival marks the most significant deployment yet under a new push to have more U.S. "strategic assets" operate in the…

Navy vessels from Australia and New Zealand will be exempt from a temporary ban on foreign ships entering the ports of the Solomon Islands, the Pacific island nation's prime minister told parliament on Monday.Foreign military vessels responding to a request for assistance from the Solomon Islands government would also be exempt, Prime Minister Manesseh Sogavare said.The Solomon Islands signed a security pact with China in April, which a leaked draft said allows the Chinese navy to replenish in Honiara…

The United States is providing Ukraine with a range of defense articles, including 23 welded-aluminum military vessels built by Louisiana-based Metal Shark, to help Ukraine to better protect its coastline, waterways and ports.Last week it was announced that six of the U.S. Navy’s new 40 PB maritime combat vessels would be sent to Ukraine as part of a $450 million security assistance package. Built by Metal Shark and delivered to the Navy in 2021 as part of a currently active defense contract for 50 vessels…

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Los Angeles District began its annual dredging of the Oceanside Harbor inlet starting April 19.Manson Construction Company of Seattle is dredging the channel to its authorized federal depth of 20 feet. Dredging is expected to be completed prior to Memorial Day weekend.About 250,000 cubic yards of beach-quality sand will be removed from the harbor’s entrance channel and placed along Oceanside’s beaches. The project’s local sponsor is the City of…

The recently approved federal work plan contains the final piece of funding for The Port of Virginia’s dredging project that will create the deepest and widest shipping channels on the U.S. East Coast by late 2024.The work plan, released last week by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, allocates funding from the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (also known as the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law) and contains $72 million for the dredging project. The federal government and the port agreed to a 50-50 cost share of the project at its outset in 2015 when the U.S.

As Europe steps up its military spending after Russia's invasion of Ukraine, Italian shipbuilder Fincantieri expects to expand its defense business, but sees M&A activity halted for now, its top executives said on Thursday.Speaking at an analysts call on 2021 results, Fincantieri CFO Giuseppe Dado said that the group's naval division was poised to grow in the short term thanks to the backlog of orders already secured.In the long-term the naval business, which makes military vessels, could rise to up to 40% of its shipbuilding segment, from a current figure of 31%, Dado said.In 2021 the shipbui

The Philippines summoned China’s ambassador on Monday to explain what it called the “illegal intrusion and lingering presence” of a Chinese navy vessel in waters between some of the archipelago nation’s largest islands.The foreign ministry in a statement said a Chinese navy reconnaissance ship entered Philippine waters without permission and lingered from Jan. 29 to Feb. 1, ignoring repeated demands to leave.It was detected off the Cuyo Group of Islands, close to Palawan, and Apo island off Mindoro…

Marine software pioneer Greensea Systems Inc. has launched spin-off company Armach Robotics, that capitalizes on Greensea’s digital expertise to offer a subscription model robotic hull cleaning system using autonomy, intelligence and data fusion to tackle biofouling.Armach Robotics is not a technology company and does not sell robots; it is a service provider offering a subscription for clean hulls and hull intelligence. Its resident cleaning robots to ships, ports, harbors and…