Lewin of Greenwich Naval History & Forum

Maritime Coastal Defence Vessels

HMCS Yellowknife conducts Hoist Ex with United States Coast Guard Helicopter


The Kingston-class Maritime Coastal Defence Vessels (MCDVs) are multi-role minor war vessels with a primary mission of coastal surveillance and patrol including general naval operations and exercises, search and rescue, law enforcement, resource protection and fisheries patrols.

Launched between 1995 and 1998, these ships are very flexible. Several types of mission specific payloads can be added to allow for rapid role change from one mission type to another such as a mechanical minesweeping system, a route survey system, and a bottom object inspection vehicle.

The 12 Kingston-class MCDVs are crewed primarily by Naval Reservists and are divided equally between both coasts.

Specifications:

Displacement: 970 tonnes (full load)

Length: 55.3 metres

Beam: 11.3 metres

Draught: 3.4 metres

Engine: Diesel-electric: Two Jeumont DC electric motors each drive a Lips azimuthing thruster with a five bladed propeller, powered by four 600V AC alternators driven by Wartsila SCAM V12 Diesels.


The Kingston-class ship’s homeports are Esquimalt, British Columbia, and Halifax, Nova Scotia.

The current Kingston-class ships are:

HMCS Kingston (700)
HMCS Glace Bay (701)
HMCS Nanaimo (702)
HMCS Edmonton (703)
HMCS Shawinigan (704)
HMCS Whitehorse (705)
HMCS Yellowknife (706)
HMCS Goose Bay (707)
HMCS Moncton (708)
HMCS Saskatoon (709)
HMCS Brandon (710)
HMCS Summerside (711)

Source; Royal Canadian Navy

Harry: These ships have proven very useful in operating/training with smaller West African navies/coast guards and the US Coast Guard in the Caribbean Sea area on drug patrols. In addition to the roles you referred to they are quite capable of supporting diving operations and regularly do so.
Brian
Annapolis 265/TerraNova

Annapolis265 wrote: ↑Sun Jun 09, 2019 10:02 pm Harry: These ships have proven very useful in operating/training with smaller West African navies/coast guards and the US Coast Guard in the Caribbean Sea area on drug patrols. In addition to the roles you referred to they are quite capable of supporting diving operations and regularly do so.
Brian
Annapolis 265/TerraNova

Thank you Brian for identifying that regularly performed activity conducted by this class of ship. Your contribution to the thread is much appreciated.

For info; in the General Naval Topics section; Ships/Boats Equipment forum; Containerised and/or modular weapon (and other) systems thread I give the class a further mention.

This is in relation to the trials of Towed Retractable Active Passive Sonar (TRAPS); and after a number of posts in that thread, I clarified the 'self contained' description (in relation to the source of power for these containerised equipment types); as follows:-
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Little h wrote: ↑Sat Jun 01, 2019 1:48 pm

jbryce1437 wrote: ↑Sat Jun 01, 2019 11:37 am Looks a useful piece of kit Harry.

Jim

Yep that's what I thought Jim. However (unless I've missed something ) there doesn't appear to be any mention as to the source of power for this kit. It is described as 'self contained', so an important omission IMO.


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Late edit:


Perhaps the following from Wiki goes part way to answering the issue regarding the source of power provision:-

Modular payload

Kingston-class vessels are designed to carry up to three 20-foot (6.1 m) ISO containers with power hookups on the open deck aft in order to embark mission-specific payloads.[1] As of 2009, the available modules included:[1]

2 × Indal Technologies AN/SLQ 38 deep mechanical minesweeping systems
4 × MDA Ltd. AN/SQS 511 heavy-weight high-definition route survey systems
1 × ISE Ltd. Trailblazer 25 bottom object inspection vehicle
1 × ISE Ltd. HYSUB 50 deep seabed intervention system
2 × Fullerton and Sherwood Ltd. 6-man, 2-compartment containerized diving systems
6 × naval engineered 6-person accommodation modules
1 × MDA Ltd. Interim Remote Minehunting and Disposal System

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I noted the inclusion of - 2 × Fullerton and Sherwood Ltd. 6-man, 2-compartment containerized diving systems


As Hon Mod Jim said in that thread with regard to the containerised TRAPS equipment - "looks like a useful piece of kit" - I think we can extend that remark to include the Kingston Class of ships in general.

Little H: The various payloads allow the Kingston Class to do a variety of activities amd fhe accomodation containers expand accommodation to handle some of the activities that you listed. They are very useful in low threat scenarios outside of Canadian waters.
Brian
Annapolis 265/TerraNova

MARLANT Retweeted
Royal Canadian Navy
‏Verified account @RoyalCanNavy
53m53 minutes ago

HMCS Moncton is painted in a WWII Admiralty paint scheme to commemorate the 75th anniversary of the end of the #BattleoftheAtlantic. Honouring the sailors of our past, embracing the sailors of our present, looking ahead to our bright future.

#RCNRemembers

Nice looking ships Harry . Perhaps we could use a few of them on the South Coast of late.

The Kingston Class have been very useful as this thread records. HMCS Moncton has just been painted in a World War 2 camouflage scheme to celebrate the pending 75th Anniversary of the end of that war. The frigate HMCS Regina is being similarly repainted. I have pictures which I have to extract from my cell phone. Both ships look very nice.

Brian
Terra Nova/Annapolis 265

Kingston Class Coastal Defence Vessel HMCS Yellowknife pictured under refit at Point Hope Maritime Ltd Shipyard at Victoria, BC....2020.

Kingston Class Coastal Defence Vessel HMCS Yellowknife pictured departing Point Hope Maritime Shipyard, Victoria BC, February 2021.

To mark the 76th anniversary of the Battle of the Atlantic in which the RCN played such a critically important role tow of these corvette-sized ship braved the north Atlantic to visit the old home of the RCN, Londonderry. Here are pictures from this weekend just past of the sadly rather muted celebrations, but so magnificent that they took place.
tim