Navy Recognition is showing a photo of a model of a new corvette being built by Bollinger’s partner Damen for the Vietnamese Navy. The ships is the right size, 98 meters long and 14 meters of beam (321 ft x 46 ft).
We already discussed the fact that Damen had built an OPC sized ship for the Vietnamese counterpart of the USCG.
The photo even looks a little like the ships in this earlier illustration from Bollinger. The reported dimensions of the new Vietnamese vessel also correspond to the dimensions given for Damen’s 2600 ton OPV.
An interesting feature is how well armed this Vietnamese Corvette will apparently be. This bodes well for potential upgrades to the OPC. Quoting Navy Recognition:
the new SIGMA 9814 class will be fitted with:
8x MBDA Exocet MM40 Block 3
12x MBDA MICA VL surface-to-air missiles (in VLS)
1x Oto Melara 76mm main gun
2x Oto Melara MARLIN-WS 30mm gun mounts
The corvette will acomodate one anti-submarine helicopters Ka-28. The corvettes are set to receive the latest generation of electronics and sensors from Thales including TACTICOS combat management system,SMART-S Mk 2 radar and STING EO Mk 2 electro-optical fire control system.
