The UK government has purchased another offshore vessel that will this time be converted into a mother ship to launch drones for detecting mines.
Norway’s Island Offshore sold its 2013-built support vessel Island Crown for £40m ($49.5m at today’s exchange rate) to Defence Equipment and Support (DE&S), the procurement arm of the UK Ministry of Defence.
for £40m ($49.5m at today’s exchange rate) to Defence Equipment and Support (DE&S), the procurement arm of the UK Ministry of Defence.The 96.8-m-long vessel will be renamed and join the Royal Fleet Auxiliary and operate uncrewed surface vehicles (USVs) in support of mine countermeasures tasks around the UK and in European waters.
Before the sale, which according to VesselsValue data took place last August, Island Crown was mostly employed as a walk-to-work vessel.
In January, P&O Maritime Logistics’ 2019-built subsea construction vessel Topaz Tangaroa was also delivered for conversion to become the first of Britain’s two ships dedicated to safeguarding underwater infrastructure such as cables and pipelines.
