HMS Albion and RFA Mounts Bay are in the Baltic Sea as part of the Littoral Response Group (North) deployment where they linked up with the 1st Marine Regiment of the Swedish Amphibious Corps.
Albion tweeted about the ocassion, as you can see below.
🇸🇪🇬🇧 It was fantastic to work alongside our partners in the Swedish Navy 🤝, demonstrating our diverse capability and interoperability. #UkResponseGroup @RoyalNavy @RoyalMarines pic.twitter.com/fqpHGVGq9B
— HMS Albion (@hms_albion) May 31, 2021
According to a Royal Navy news release here:
“The UK-led JEF Maritime Task Group – consisting of Denmark, Finland, Estonia, Iceland, Latvia, Lithuania, the Netherlands, Sweden, Norway, and the UK – is poised to respond to crises whenever and wherever they unfold, so training like this is important to keep personnel ready for any missions.
The ships – both of which are equipped and designed to support Royal Marines on amphibious operations – worked with Swedish CB90-class fast assault craft and amphibious hovercraft (LCAC(M)), the largest such craft to embark in Albion, on docking operations in Mysingen fjord (in the southern part of the Stockholm Archipelago).
Royal Marines landing craft and Offshore Raiding Craft joined the CB90s on navigation exercises through the complex archipelago – which is a cluster of some 30,000 islands, skerries and rocks and the second-largest archipelago in the Baltic Sea – refreshing their ability to work together.”
The Royal Navy say that the the Littoral Response Group (North) Task Group now prepares to participate in Baltops 50; the largest multinational exercise taking place in the Baltic Sea.
Describing the deployment, the Royal Navy said previously:
“More than 1,000 sailors and Royal Marines are heading on a three-month mission to the North Atlantic and Baltic at the beginning of a new era of commando operations. This is the first deployment of the Littoral Response Group (North) task group, which is the first of two forces – centred around Royal Marines and amphibious ships – that will regularly carry out operations in areas of interest to the UK, providing reassurance to allies and deter potential adversaries.
In the coming months they will be involved in US-led exercises in Norway and participate in NATO’s Baltops, the largest multinational exercise in the Baltic Sea. This task group is made up of amphibious assault ship HMS Albion and landing dock RFA Mounts Bay, plus Type 23 frigate HMS Lancaster, Wildcat helicopters from 847 Naval Air Squadron, and Royal Marines from 45 and 30 Commando.”
Interesting mix of EU/non EU,NATO/ non NATO countries working together in an area where Britain can make a real difference.
LCAC(M), whats this?
RMs operate LCAC(L), but is this a medium?
Not seen any sign of that but am out of date!
theirs
In that context yes, but not the original.
Might be pedantry, but accuracy is important especially in this forum.
One “s” too many and short of a comma.
Yep, no way that photo shows one of our 4 LCAC ( L ) looks far too big.
Seems Sweden has 3x Griffon 8100TD
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-WDdbfojBHY
Edited to provide better link
Awful lot going on with our Armed forces and other nations at the moment ,plus CSG do there know something we don’t 🤔
Well done. More of this.
Would be really interesting to know what the RN/RM really think of LCAC and CB90 as for me this is the combination we should have,
CB90’s seem great for inshore patrol and raiding and LCAC or S2S connectors are good for the heavy lift.. both can be delivered via the Karel doorman platform which the RN would be wise to adopt IMO.
surely a CB90 is better than an ORC?
CB 90s where trialled well over 15 years ago…The RN/RM havent got them so you can draw your own conclusions why they didn’t bother with them…(cost wasn’t one of the issues either). They are far heavier than the LCVP and some extremely intrusive and major redesign work would have been required on the upper deck area and the davits to accommodate them ( LPDs and Ocean at that time). They also don’t carry vehicles so they are no good for dropping the ramp and putting something onto the shoreline like a BV or LR.
I worked on repairing and overhauling the USN Command Boat that was bought by the USN for a trial (it had a couple of holes in it from bad driving!). It was pretty much a CB90. A lot more comfy that an LCVP inside but also a lot more complex and cramped with regards to access to systems. As with lots of military kit a CB90 is BMW X5 M with all the optional extras when you really need a LCVP Toyota Hilux with the only optional extra being a radio.
LCAC operations mean that the center barrier in the dock needs to come out. This would mess up the entire dock with regards to wave motion. As things stand with 4 x LCUs operating the fumes and noise are horrendous in there for the Line Handling teams working on the dock catwalks and that’s before you start moving vehicles onto the dock beach and into connectors . An LCAC would make things even worse. I also doubt that an LCAC would make a good mother ships for smaller boats like ORCs. They are big, noisey and not very fuel efficient. This is something LCUs do with ease. You send out an LCU with a AMMO, water and fuel bladder on the deck and use it as a base of operations and resupply for ORC raiders. This extends the reach of your forces by hundreds of miles along a coast line.
Lots of ORCs, on their stowage trailers, can take up one lane in an LPD (STBD). They can launch and deploy directly from the dock. There is an overhead crane above the lane that could have been used to lift and shift them directly into the dock from the trailers. The A&A proposal to mod the crane and rails and the Mezzanine deck (Fwd) where submitted by me back in 2012 to make operations on the vehicle deck far easier . The Mez deck extension A&A was done on both LPDs (Mostly steel work). I never found out if the crane mod was fully completed before I left to my next (and Final ) RN job . I hope it was because the OC it would deliver for moving items from the Fwd end of the vehicle deck directly into a waiting LCU in the dock would make life so much easier and efficient.
Correction to a typo…I really need to proofread before submitting comments…….the A&A was in 2010 when we refitted Bulwark. I left her in the first quarter of 2011.
thanks Gunbuster, so the new BMT Caiman 60 /90 and Orcs/other is the way to go.. by the sound of it.
for the new ships coming on line, I just think we need to decide how we will deliver this amphibious piece, if that is indeed what we are going to do (not sure we have enough people to do it)
I think Albion and Bulwark are probably the most under rated ships in the fleet, but when we replace them I do hope that we think all these things through, including your crane design etc..
I do often wonder why T26 and potentially T31 have this articulated crane arm instead of a rail that goes straight through the ship and can be extended out either side as needed, surely this is better, cheaper, simpler?? (bit like the one used on the rear of absalon but far bigger.
Just looked at the twitter picture . They did the crane mod by the looks of it. The Overhead rail is there over the dock….which is nice!
Yet again, as the advert says “priceless”….
I am sure the Russian have been busy monitoring all the joint ops and the CSG
reckon ? 😄
So is Sweden is going to join NATO, not too long?
Not gonna join but they know who their enemies are and that we aren’t.
Probably no more than normal, but given more publicity on purpose.