HMS Bangor is expected to complete structural repairs by the end of April 2026, the Ministry of Defence has confirmed.
In response to a parliamentary question from Conservative MP Ben Obese-Jecty, Defence Minister Luke Pollard clarified that the vessel is not undergoing a formal refit, but instead is receiving repairs following damage sustained during deployed operations.
“HMS BANGOR is not in refit; the ship is undergoing structural repairs following the ship’s recovery from deployed operations,” Pollard said. “These are currently scheduled to have been completed by the end of April 2026.”
HMS Bangor is a Sandown-class minehunter, a class of vessels specifically designed to detect and neutralise naval mines in complex maritime environments. Displacing around 600 tonnes and measuring 52.5 metres in length, the ship is optimised for operations in shallow and confined waters.
The vessel is powered by diesel-electric propulsion using Paxman Valenta engines, combined with Voith Schneider propellers and bow thrusters, giving it exceptional manoeuvrability.
Its primary sensor is the Type 2093 variable depth sonar, capable of detecting mines on or near the seabed at significant depths. This is supported by radar systems and mine disposal capabilities, including remotely operated SeaFox systems and diver-placed charges. For self-defence, the ship is fitted with a 30mm DS30B gun, alongside machine guns, although its primary role remains mine countermeasures rather than combat operations.
The vessel sustained damage during a collision while deployed in the Middle East, and there had previously been uncertainty over whether repairs would be carried out given earlier plans to retire the ship. However, Bangor has since been retained in service, with plans to extend her operational life to maintain the Royal Navy’s deep-water minehunting capability.
Is she the last working mine hunter we have? i know we have drone mine hunters but not many and they are not fully in service. Has there been a case quickly retire stuff, gap ita bit and save money in the hort term. As always just cross fingers we do not need what we retired, like AWAC’s which still have none of.
We still have Ledbury, Cattistock, Brocklesby, Middleton (Commissioned but inactive) and Hurworth, Chiddingfold is not active but is still in commission
The last Sandown class, yes.
Some of the Hunts remain at HMNB Portsmouth.
Are they in service or just tied up there?
In service, AFAIK. One has been cannibalised for parts.
ok, the last bit sums up the state of the Navy well, cannibalised for parts. Heard that more than once in regard to our navy, plus they are very old ships.
Waiting for the RN to try and sell them off.
Thats the truth not ready, not deployable just waiting for scraping or selling, yet i bet the Navy/Mod would say they fully ready to deploy, lies and half truths it never ends this utter rubbish and fake stats about what we have to what we have that works, blind fools in LA LA land.
HMS Dragoon was what happens when some calls thier bluff, deflect and out and out lies about her readness state, and navy as whole.
Are in service and working or just on strength in port ? we have a lot of ships in port most not working awaiting spares/crew or upgrade. I know the MOD/Government tend be less than up front about what ships can be used if needed and what basicly retired but not listed as such.
If only we had more of these, very small, barley armed, plastic ships that have no survival rating, we could reopen the straits of Hormuz.
Those fast drones able to do the job three times faster that are air deployable, can launch from shore and don’t have to put a man in harms way are totally useless 🤦♂️.
It’s always shocking to me just how much people in the UK and our media talk down every single thing we do, largely because of their own ignorance and mis placed nostalgia.
You can see the same thing in Ukraine, we acted like every piece of kit we sent out their was s**t yet I see wall to wall videos from Ukrainian soldiers loving CR2, AS90, CVR(t) etc. more so than L2, Archer, Pz2000 etc.
Just last week people on here were banging on about how much better the French mine sweeping system is because is needs a dedicated mine hunting vessel. No one seemed to figure how the f**k a dedicated mine hunting vessel is going to take to get to the Arabian gulf nor how it’s going to operate in a contested environment. Ours can be flown in a c17 and get there in 8 hours and can be operated from the shore but it’s apparently s**t because it doesn’t look like a minesweeper.
The issue isn’t moving to autonomous minehunting, which can only be a good thing. It’s gapping capability. Until three months ago we had a permanent presence, so it would have take no time to get the old system to the Gulf.
Exactly.
Is it gapping a capability? the Americans moved their minesweepers out of Bahrain at the same time. If our minesweepers had been there they would be targets.
Why do you think the US and UK governments remove all their assets from a place just a few weeks before starting the biggest war in 30 years?
Budget constraints?
We still have 7 minesweeper in the fleet plus three of the new systems operational, I fail to see the gap.
Sorry to point out the obvious but the Royal Navy is part of the Armed Forces. It’s their job to be targets, or at least in harms way depending on whichever vernacular you would like to use. The drones are pretty much still experimental, they have never to my knowledge been used in a real life situation. Ultimately, if they prove effective they will be a good addition. But getting rid of a proven capability in the hope the new stuff will work is not what I expect from my leadership team.
The drones are not experimental, the system is worked up and currently on active deployment. Also worth pointing out that all the onboard systems for the Sandown class (also drones) have never been used in a combat situation.
I think most people in the armed forces and the country at large would disagree with your assessment that it’s their job to be targets. Where on earth did you get such a notion, sounds like it’s straight from the mouth of Trump or Hegseth.
As members of the armed forces its their job to do harm to the enemies of his majesty, not present said enemies with a target.
For the RN I think it was coincidental, driven by the retirement of the only escort we had in the area, making the crewed mine counter-measures capability unviable. The announcement happened months before the US build up.
They have been testing the drone prototypes for some years now, including trialling RNMB Harrier in the Gulf in 2023/24. Wasn’t the 12m RNMB Ariande described as the first of the production systems this time last yeear? If the war ends and MCM is required, I can see them being used for clean up. However, the autonomous programme is supposed to be introduced over a decade, and we haven’t declared IOC. I wouldn’t call them on active deployment (unless you mean by the French in the Baltic).
Waiting for the RN to try and sell them off.
See Jonathan’s post below for details.
9 USV/RNMB at present, 3 of which are dedicated to Faslane, with 3 more at Portsmouth, and 3 in Echo Sqn as expeditionary, are no replacement for 24 MCMV until they are a lot more numerous.
When phase 2 of MCM programme gets delivered ( and it’s on hold like most else at present ) then we will be getting somewhere.
Good kit, state of the art, built to warship standards.
Till then, 8 blokes with a handful of USV doesn’t replace what was in the Gulf until recently, regardless of the environment.
When was the last time we had 24 MCMV’s. Certainly not this century.
Around the late 90s early 2000s, before Lord West cut a whole range of assets. There were 12 Hunt and 12 Sandown.
Not “glamourous” like a county Infantry Battalion, or a famous regimental name, the lowly MCMV was an easy and regular salami slice, and slice they have to what is left today. Those cuts were not made for capabilities sake, but financial savings.
Have a read of NL, the RN has gambled on the new tech and disposed of the remaining traditional assets too soon.
Once the RN is up to 6 Systems and has the 4 mothers as well, we will be in a better place here.
Yes that was my thoughts, late 90’s when we had those numbers.
💯👍🏻
Hi Jim, folks hope all you are all well.
Agree Jim, the UK is crap at all it does according to the main stream media, always ready to put the boot in when having a go at our military. So only last week we had the breaking news of the magnificent French navy coming to the rescue of protection of UK Cyprus bases. No they are not it’s so called protection of a EU member. Haven’t heard much about the French deployment only to say that Macron has confirmed the French navy will not be used to escort shipping though the Strait of Hurmuz. Meanwhile, the RAF are conducting operations shooting down drones.
Cheers
George
You wrong about AS90, we have nothing to replace it, yes it was not the best in range etc but better than emply gun parks with nothing due in to replace what we sent until 2030/31. Its right get ride of older kit, but to not replace it is the thinking of idiots. We just go with out, Ajax has not replaced CVRT, as it does not work, yet we have no CVRT’s, 14 batch one older type Archers does not replace AS90, all gifting kit, moving it on.
It must be replaced by some thing better, rather than nothing.
I’m not wrong about AS90, I agree with you, AS90 was a highly capable platform just like CR2, a basic upgrade would have out it back at the very leading edge of western military equipment.
As I said the Ukrainians sing its prays and complain about Archer and Pz2000.
Same goes for CR2, slated all the time on here yet it’s outperformed Abrams and Lepoard 2 in Ukraine.
Exact same thing happened in GW1 with Challenger 1.
It’s people in Britain and our media that slate everything we do and that’s no magnified by foreign agents and bots on the internet.
We make great kit, but we never make enough or up grade it. Its kept until in out classsed then retired with no replacement even on order. Its been like that for years and glossed over, we can make the best but we hate spending money on it and then use it until its on its last legs. PZ2000 is great but to technical and its sensitive to damp/dirty its just too clever for its own good, And C2 beats any other tank in armour and gun range in a real war yet no one in press sings its prase.
As90 just needed an upgraded barrel we had a gun in service in 2001 that had a longer range but for some reason we never went with it the Ukrainian soldiers think As90 is the dogs bollocks
Project Braveheart, I did hear at the time there was an issue with propellant.
Yup that’s the one
The decision to extend Bangor in service was surprising. Does anyone know what the Sandowns can do that the Hunts can’t?
Shallow water operations. Shes being retained almost entirely because without her there’s no way to safeguard the Clyde bases and most importantly the nuclear deterrence from subsurface mine/unmanned threats.
Hunt sonar is fixed to the hull, while Sandown sonar is on a winch so can be lowered deep in the water below thermoclines.
Thank you.
We often forget with our focus on the drop in numbers of large surface combatant escorts from 32/33to 12 by the end of the year, that not so long ago the RN had 28 ocean going mine warfare vessels.. now it’s all lovely saying these will be replaced by little autonomous boats and 3 mother ships, but those mine warfare vessels had a wider purpose they were ocean going patrol and presence vessels as well as 9 OPVs.. that gave the RN a total of not only 28 mine warfare ships but a combined total of 37 smaller ocean going combatants.. with 32/33 frigates and destroyers that’s 70 vessels before you add the amphibious and RFA and this was not a Cold War navy.. this was a peacetime unipolar navy.. now when the world is on the edge of WW3 we have 12 large and at best 15 small vessels with a plan to dispose of all but 8 small vessels.
Our mine warfare capability is probably the best example of the insanity of the drone model.. one of those mine sweepers not only does mine warfare, but
It does patrol and presence.. it’s a ship it has meaning beyond.. yes it can only operate in benign environments or if less than benign under the protection of an escort.. but it can manage grey warfare it can hold the line in a sub kinetic environment… and the future will be a lot about grey warfare and sub kinetic as well as deterrence of the kinetic…
The mine warfare drone capability has sucked HMG into the same false premise that the Gold plated T45 did.. if a type 45 can do the same job as 2 type 45s then you only need half the number.. if one mother ship and 4 drones can do the job of 5 minesweepers you only need 20% of the crewed mine warfare vessels and the RN is falling into the same trap again with the Atlantic Bastion.. 1 frigate and some drone buddies or 1 T83 and some drone buddies…this unfortunately is and always has been a false premise.. because the utter and fundamental requirement of a ship is first and Foremost to be there in that place at that time with a human crew that can make an impact with their presence… and HMS massive ( T45 ) can only be in one place at one time.. a mother ship and 4 drones can only be in one place at one time.. this is why throughout history in major naval wars ( not battles but large long major maritime wars) the navy with the most numbers of ships ( even if most of them are HMS crappy) almost always wins… contrary to what we imagine the RN spent almost its entire history winning with quite frankly sometimes really inferior ships.. what it had was lots of ships, that allowed to to be everywhere at every time that mattered, it also allowed it to practice a lot and get really good ( large navies are well practiced navies.. thee more restrictive your ship numbers the less crews you can train and the smaller your talent pool and experience.. this starts to impact.. one U.S. captain wrote a very good piece for the US navel college pointing out that PLAN captains now get more command experience than USN captains as an example of why numbers will make a difference)
Sorry I was on my phone with lots of errors there, one line should read “if a T45 can do the job of 2 T42s…
The problem is these minesweepers are ridiculously expensive and made with plastic hulls making them incredibly vulnerable. Modern mines are not magnetic so plastic hulls are a total waste of time other than to put the lives of sailors at even more at risk.
Because of the crappy plastic hulls they are a terrible way to provide any form of presents. These ships cost more than a type 23 frigate back in the day and they have about as much military utility in patrol tasking as a Scottish Fisheries protection boat even less so because of the vulnerable hull.
Worst of all they are completely useless for hunting modern mines due to their small size and inability to operate large drones. I really think people don’t have any inclination of what modern mines are and just how lethal they are. We are talking about autonomous torpedos that can self deploy to an area and sit on the sea bed waiting for an acoustic or wake signature before activating and hunting down the vessel that set them off.
It’s beyond me why anyone woukd want to put a Royal Navy sailor in that environment to do nothing but wave a flag when we have robots that can do it much better and quicker.
If we want a patrol boat then there is the batch 2 rivers which are ideal for the task. If you need presence in Bahrain you can get a cutlass class for £5 million which is way more capable than a Sandown class ever could be for minor presence missions near land.
Yes but we are not replacing them with the same numbers or assessing what are presence needs to be..and that’s the problem the only focus has been on the minimum capability.. not the minimum presence.
Take the T45, that was classic they essentially focused on the capability and what was essentially the minimum numbers of that AAW capability we could get away with… the problem was they did not look at well thats 12 warships.. how many of those do we in regards to having a full fat warship in specific numbers of places at specific times..
So a rational assessment could have been.. as a T45 is 2 times as effective as an AAW we only need 1 for 2 as an AAW escort.. but we only really have a need for AAW escort to be in two places at any Time.. so that’s 6.. but we still need an extra 2 ship deployments.. ok let’s buy 6 reasonable patrol/GP frigates.. that’s the sane way to assess..
And they needed to do the same with the 28 strong mine warfare fleet, how many drones will we need and motherships to cover the mine warfare elements but then how many crewed commissioned warships will we need to cover the patrol and maritime presence work and what does that presence commissioned warship look like for the 21c.. so I’m not suggesting they buy 28 mine warfare motherships.. that would be silly. But actually what are they buying for presence.
Fantastic, it will soon be sold as usual in the Ministry of Cuts
It’s worth remember that the UK can effectively call upon two Ukrainian Sandown class MCMV’s – Chernihiv (ex Grimsby) and Cherkasy (ex Shoreham). These are “temporarily” based at Portsmouth and regularly take part in exercises around the UK. Obviously Ukraine is not a NATO member so restrictions will apply.
I’m not sure they will be willing to die in the straits of Hormuz to keep US gas prices down by 60cents.
That isn’t a ship, it’s a Boat.
Big for a boat….Sandown-class minehunter ; 600 t (590 long tons; 660 short tons) · 52.5 m (172 ft 3 in) · 10.9 m (35 ft 9 in) · 2.3 m (7 ft 7 in)
Your Russian ones are probably similar.
Have you heard of a MCMV Ship?
Former SECAUR said these should be in the straits of Hormuz NOW, to protect our gas supplies…