UK — Fortress of the Sea returns to the waves

Portsmouth, Unit­ed King­dom: HMS Edin­burgh has emerged sleek­er and faster as she embarks on sea tri­als fol­low­ing an exten­sive £17.5 mil­lion over­haul by BAE Sys­tems, demon­strat­ing the company’s capa­bil­i­ty in naval sup­port and ser­vices.

The last of the Type 42 destroy­ers to under­go a major upkeep, HMS Edin­burgh has been fit­ted with a new under­wa­ter spoil­er to her stern, known as a tran­som flap, and a coat of new ‘inter­sleek’ paint that will cut fuel con­sump­tion by up to 15%. A new­ly refur­bished diesel engine has also been fit­ted to the ship, whilst its IT net­work, accom­mo­da­tion areas, fresh water sys­tems, gal­ley and laun­dry facil­i­ties have all been revamped to ensure the 30 year old ship is fight­ing fit as she pre­pares to return to the Roy­al Navy’s fleet next month. 

HMS Edinburgh’s com­mand­ing offi­cer, Com­man­der Paul Rus­sell, said: “The close part­ner­ship between the ship’s com­pa­ny and BAE Sys­tems has seen the refit pro­gramme surge ahead over the last few weeks, and the ship will be fit for oper­a­tional ser­vice lat­er this year. We now have to put Edin­burgh through her paces at sea and turn a safe and ful­ly equipped ves­sel into a war-fight­ing unit once again.” 

Mal­colm Fudge, BAE Sys­tems’ project man­ag­er for the HMS Edin­burgh refit, said: “We work side by side with the Roy­al Navy here in Portsmouth to main­tain the sur­face fleet and have worked tire­less­ly over recent months to con­duct this inten­sive refit. 

“We are now embark­ing on a crit­i­cal stage of the pro­gramme as we test the engi­neer­ing work to ensure that she has been brought back to a ful­ly oper­a­tional stan­dard before she returns to the fleet for her final years of service.” 

The sea tri­als will test the ship’s propul­sion machin­ery, radar and com­mu­ni­ca­tion equip­ments, as well as its abil­i­ty to con­duct fly­ing oper­a­tions. HMS Edinburgh’s sig­na­tures will then be assessed for radar cross sec­tion, heat, mag­net­ic and acoustics before tri­als cul­mi­nat­ing in live fir­ings of medi­um and close range weapons. 

The Fortress of the Sea is set to be for­mal­ly accept­ed back into the Roy­al Navy fleet in late Octo­ber, fol­lowed by a Reded­i­ca­tion Cer­e­mo­ny in ear­ly Novem­ber. BAE Sys­tems will con­tin­ue to sup­port the ship through her Oper­a­tional Sea Train­ing ear­ly next year in prepa­ra­tion for her six month over­seas deploy­ment in May. 

About BAE Sys­tems
BAE Sys­tems is a glob­al defence, secu­ri­ty and aero­space com­pa­ny with approx­i­mate­ly 107,000 employ­ees world­wide. The Com­pa­ny deliv­ers a full range of prod­ucts and ser­vices for air, land and naval forces, as well as advanced elec­tron­ics, secu­ri­ty, infor­ma­tion tech­nol­o­gy solu­tions and cus­tomer sup­port ser­vices. In 2009 BAE Sys­tems report­ed sales of £22.4 bil­lion (US$ 36.2 billion). 

For fur­ther infor­ma­tion please contact: 

Kristi­na Crowe, BAE Sys­tems
Tel: +44 (0) 239 289 6232 Mob: +44 (0)7540628673
kristina.crowe@baesystems.com

Gillian Churchill, BAE Sys­tems
Tel: +44 (0) 141 957 2150 Mob: +44 (0)7540628325
gillian.churchill@baesystems.com

Issued by: 

BAE Sys­tems, Farn­bor­ough, Hamp­shire GU14 6YU, UK
Tel: +44 (0) 1252 384605 Fax: +44 (0) 1252 383947;
24hr media hot­line: + 44 (0) 7801 71773 

Source:
BAE Systems 

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