HMS Exploit (P167)

HMS Exploit
History
United Kingdom
Name: HMS Exploit
Operator: Royal Navy
Builder: Vosper Thornycroft
Commissioned: 1988
Identification:
Status: in active service
General characteristics
Class and type: Archer class patrol vessel
Displacement: 54 tonnes
Length: 20.8 m (68 ft)
Beam: 5.8 m (19 ft)
Draught: 1.8 m (5 ft 11 in)
Propulsion: 2 shafts, Rolls Royce M800T diesels, 1,590 bhp
Speed:
  • 20 kn (37 km/h)
  • 45 kn (83 km/h) (Hull design, but limited due to engine fitted)
Range: 550 nmi (1,020 km)
Complement:
  • 18 (training)[N 1]
  • 12 (operational)
Sensors and
processing systems:		 Decca 1216 navigation radar
Armament:

HMS Exploit is an Archer-class (or P2000) patrol and training vessel of the British Royal Navy, built in Woolston by Vosper Thornycroft and commissioned in 1988.[1][2] She is attached to Birmingham University Royal Naval Unit (URNU), which exists to provide training to undergraduate students in a wide range of naval skills and to provide opportunities for personal development.

The ship's company consists of a permanent staff of the commanding officer, two senior rates and two junior rates, but can take up to twelve students with training officers usually embarked when conducting navigational training. Whilst at sea, students are able to put into practice navigation and seamanship skills they have learnt in the classroom during weekly training nights. These include chart planning, acting as Officer of the Watch, using the ship's radar and carrying out seamanship evolutions from anchoring to securing alongside. Instruction is given in engineering, firefighting, damage control and ship handling. 'Sea weekend' training is usually limited to visiting UK coastal ports but recent Easter and summer deployments have included visits to France, Holland, Belgium, and the Channel Islands. The ship is based in HMNB Portsmouth.

Operational history

Royal Naval Auxiliary Service

XSV Exploit was originally ordered for the now defunct Royal Naval Auxiliary Service (RNXS) and had a distinctive black hull like other RNXS vessels.

On 19 March 1994, a serious machinery space fire occurred on Exploit approximately 30 miles of Lundy island as she was being transferred to Portsmouth from Greenock as part of the managed run down of the service by RNXS crew. The Padstow lifeboat and the RAF SAR Helicopter from Chivenor, were scrambled, and a tanker on route to Milford Haven was diverted to help, but were not needed. The fire was later attributed to a major mechanical failure of the starboard main engine, resulting in a large hole in the sump casing. The fire spread quickly to the air ducts, igniting various rubber coolant pipes causing thick acrid smoke.[3]

Royal Navy

In June 2017, Exploit, in company with HM Ships Smiter, Ranger and Archer, deployed to the Baltic to take part in the NATO BALTOPS exercise, the first time that Royal Navy P2000s have been involved in such an exercise.[4]

Affiliations

Notes

  1. ↑ 5 ship's company, 1 training officer, 12 URNU students.
  2. ↑ When operational and not in URNU role.

References

  1. ↑ Royal Navy - Patrol Boats - Archer class, royalnavy.mod.uk, Retrieved 4 June 2018
  2. ↑ "archer class". armed forces.net.
  3. ↑ "The Volunteer". The Volunteer (The Final Journal of the Royal Naval Auxiliary Service) Published March 1994,Holbrook printers, Portsmouth. March 1994.
  4. ↑ http://www.royalnavy.mod.uk/news-and-latest-activity/news/2017/june/30/170630-1st-patrol-boat-squadron-baltops-endeavour


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