NAC News – Edition J397 HMCS New Liskeard
Your weekly national and international naval news for the week of February 19th, 2021
Edition – J397 HMCS New Liskeard (WW2 Algerine Class minesweeper)
Rod Hughes – Editor NAC News rhughes@shaw.ca (comments welcome to help improve this service)
Contact David Soule executivedirector-nac@outlook.com if you wish someone (who may be a member or perhaps a good candidate to join) to be added to the NAC News email distribution.
★ Editor’s stars of the week
Keep in touch with NAC
If you are receiving NAC News consider joining NAC – Membership and Renewal
Archived weekly NAC News Links
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/navalassn/
TWITTER @navalassn
Should you wish to donate or leave a memorial – NAC Endowment Fund
NAC reference to assist veterans and/or seniors is located at Veteran’s Corner
Keep in touch with the RCN
Facebook – RoyalCanadianNavy | MarineRoyaleCanadienne;
Twitter – @RoyalCanNavy | @MarineRoyaleCan;
LinkedIn – RoyalCanadianNavy-MarineRoyaleCanadienne
Instagram – RoyalCanNavy | MarineRoyaleCan;
Flickr – RoyalCanadianNavy-MarineRoyaleCanadienne
YouTube – RoyalCanadianNavy | MarineRoyaleCanadienne
Vimeo – RoyalCanadianNavy-MarineRoyaleCanadienne
NOTICES
- Monday 22 February at 1pm (Ottawa time) – join the Veterans Affairs Canada virtual event to learn more about “a vision on the future of remembrance and recognition in Canada.” The event features the Minister of Veterans Affairs, Dr Lee Windsor, and Captain (Retd) Hélène Le Scelleur who will outline how this new approach will better serve the Veteran community. Sign up at letstalkveterans.ca
- Tuesday 23 February 2021, 1200 – 1330 (Ottawa time) The RCN is embracing “Black History Month” by virtually (MS Teams in a panel format) bring three distinguished and inspirational leaders for a Black History Month Panel – Focus of the discussion is how the RCN can move towards to becoming a better ally for members of the Black community. Registration is required; contact LCdr Teri Share Teri.Share@forces.gc.ca no later than 22 February.
- Wednesday 3 March 2021, 1200 Ottawa time. Maritime Affairs Virtual (Zoom) Speaker Series – Deputy CCG Commissioner Chris Henderson will speak on the Future of the CCG. Made possible by Seaspan Shipyards and hosted by the Navy League of Canada. To register email rsvp@navyleague.ca You will receive an email confirmation. Meeting link will be sent 1 March 2021.
- 10-12 June 2021 – Canadian Nautical Research Society: Canada’s Pacific Gateway, Past Present and Future. The Society will hold its annual conference 10–11 June 2021 and is “ Canada’s Pacific Gateway, past present and future”. Proposals are invited for papers or presentations related to the general theme of Canada’s wider Pacific Ocean dimensions or other maritime contemporary and historical topics. This virtual conference will commemorate the 150th anniversary of BC joining Canada, 25 July 1871. Traditional conference planned for in Victoria on these dates have been cancelled.
- Editor – I recommend the “Wild Apricot for Members” app – There are three main features your members can access with the app. Under “Events”: View an event calendar and event details, register for an event through the app, view existing event registrations, Pay an outstanding event registration fee. Under “Member Directory” View your organization’s entire member directory, View member profiles, Email and call fellow members. Under “Personal Profile” View their personal profile, including their membership renewal date
___________________________________
CANADA
- ★ Technological Advancements Make The CSC The Right Choice For The Royal Canadian Navy (Editor – a great summary of a superb ship)
- Black History Month 2021 (Editor – MND 2:52 min video) plus Ceremony in Halifax marks 1st navy vessel named for Black Canadian (Editor – see Black History Month 23 Feb virtual panel discussion above in Notices)
- Harry DeWolf-class arctic patrol ships of Canadian Navy to monitor and secure Arctic sovereignty
- It will be at least a decade before Canada sees any of its new frigates
- Video: Canadian Air Force Performs Long-Range Medevac from Tanker (Editor – 1:19 min video included)
- Canadian Defence Agency To Test Fly V-BAT VTOL UAV On Coast Guard Vessels
- The Harry DeWolf Class (Editor – great RCN 3:58 min video)
- Boarding parties in the Persian Gulf (Editor – one of ours recounting the First Gulf War experience)
- Registry will help identify Canadian war dead in unmarked graves
- Icebreaking program specialists (Editor CCG specialist explained in this 2:12 min video)
- Veteran’s Ombudsman Mental Health Treatment Benefits for Family Members, in their Own Right, for Conditions Related to Military Service (Editor – comprehensive report)
___________________________________
USA & AMERICAS
- USNI News Fleet and Marine Tracker: Feb. 18, 2021
- IKE Carrier Strike Group Commands SEALs, Marine Missile Teams in First-of-a-Kind, Large-Scale Drill
- Italian Navy aircraft carrier ITS Cavour arrives at US Naval Station Norfolk to conduct F-35B qualification training
- Pentagon: One Third of Service Members Offered COVID-19 Vaccines Have Refused
- Training Air Wing Commodore Logs 1,000-Trap Milestone Aboard USS Gerald R. Ford (Editor – experience is truly invaluable)
- Coast Guard Cutter Polar Star Collects High-Latitude Data of Remote Arctic Region
- Falklands defined as British Independent Overseas Territory by US Navy triggers reaction in Buenos Aires
- ★ Subsea Defense: Navy Deepens Commitment to Underwater Vehicles
- Enterprise Moves So Newport News Shipbuilding Can Upgrade 80-Year-Old Pier
- Why Should Your Captain Listen to You? (Editor – sage advice)
- Navy Announces Timeline to Dismantle Fire-Damaged Bonhomme Richard, Sideline 2 LCSs
- Report to Congress on DDG(X)
- Report to Congress on John Lewis-class Oiler Program (Editor – USN to build 20!)
- The U.S. Navy Might Ditch All Of Its Shallow-Water Combatants
- 66 Years of Undersea Surveillance (Editor – interesting explanation of how “SOSUS” evolved to meet today’s needs)
- U.S. Coast Guard Racks Up Drug Busts with $70M Cocaine Haul and Photos: Two Cutters Seize $150M in Cocaine in the Eastern Pacific
- Pentagon: One Third of Service Members Offered COVID-19 Vaccines Have Refused (Editor – a woefully low percentage in my opinion, and speaks to the impact of the volume of vaccine disinformation out there)
- Meet The Navy’s GPS Pioneer Dr. Gladys West
- Robots deployed at A68A mega-iceberg remnants
- US Navy Tests 3D Printed Radars
- DARPA Building an Energy-Harvesting Submarine That Never Runs Out Of Power
- Cold Snap Shuts Houston Ship Channel
- Video: Containership Backlog in Southern California Sets More Records (Editor – supply chain delays! Amazing footage of the port of Long Beach in a 2:13 min video)
- Distinguishing rice from wrong: important lessons from the Hamburg port drug bust of 2020 (Editor – interesting interwoven stories)
- Los Angeles Addresses Backlog and Diverts Ships as Volumes Rise
____________________________________
INDO-PACIFIC
- Kelly McParland: What will it take for the Liberals to admit that China is dangerous? (Editor – “Shed the blinders of the past and see the world and our place in it as it is”, former CSIS Director Richard Fadden)
- French Amphibious Ready Group Set Sails For The Indo-Pacific
- ★ Pakistan Hosts 45 Navies for Joint Drills, Including Russia, China, and NATO Members
- Destroyer USS Russell Performs South China Sea FONOP
- US must ensure Taiwan does not fall (Editor – a fight over Taiwan would have worldwide implications) and What might a China-Taiwan clash look like? plus Evaluating the PLA Navy’s Options to Pressure Taiwan and Test Biden
- ★ Republic of Singapore Navy uses USV and K-Ster EMDS to Neutralize Underwater Threat (Editor – 5:15 min video)
- Threat of empowered Chinese Coast Guard understated
- PLA Navy commissions final Type 056A corvettes specialized in coastal defense
- Russian, Iranian navies kick off joint drills in Indian Ocean
- China Increases Production of AIP Submarines with Massive New Shipyard
- India should go for a denial strategy
- MDL Delivers 3rd Scorpene-Class Submarine to the Indian Navy
- Australian warships to join British Carrier Group
- Existence of 2 more border islets cannot be confirmed
- Maersk boxship loses hundreds of containers after suffering engine failure
____________________________________
EUROPE
- China overtakes US as EU’s biggest trading partner (Editor – not sure what the implications are)
- Turkey Deploys Research Vessel in Aegean Sea Sparking Protests from Greece
- HMS Blyth Joins NATO Task Group For North Sea Ordnance Disposal Operations
- Denmark Ramps Up Arctic Naval Defense Spending
- Dutch MoD Orders Drone Systems for Mine Countermeasures Capability Replacement
- Intermarine Wins Contract For Italian Navy’s New Generation MCM Vessel
- UMISAS synthetic aperture sonar trialled ahead of integration for BE/NL MCM programme
- Turkey’s Armed USV “ULAQ” starts sea trials (Editor – 1:49 min video)
- Russian Northern Fleet delivers over 20,000 tonnes of fuel to its Arctic facilities
- Wallenius Wilhelmsen to Build World’s First Full-scale Wind-powered RoRo vessel
- Maersk to Launch First Carbon Neutral Vessel in 2023
____________________________________
MIDDLE EAST
- F-35Bs from American assault ship to fight Islamic State
- US Navy Seizes Weapons from Dhows off Somalia (Editor – supply an infantry battalion!)
- HMS Montrose seizes over $15 million worth of narcotics in Arabian sea (Editor – under the Command of Canadian Cmdre Daniel Charlebois & his joint Canadian-Australian Combined Task Force(CTF)-150 and HMS Montrose Seizes Heroin and Meth in Back-to-Back Busts
- Standing NATO Maritime Group (SNMG) 2 visits Haifa, trains with Israel forces
- Lürssen delivers second batch of patrol vessels to Egyptian Navy
- US approves sale of surface-to-air missiles to Egypt
- Fincantieri shipyard from Italy launches second Doha-class corvette Damsah for Qatari Navy
- Egypt and Spain conduct transit maritime training in the Red Sea
- Iran Accuses U.S. of Piracy Over Oil Cargo Seizure
- Four Years On and Literally Meters from Land, Tanker Crew Still Stuck Aboard (Editor – a strange story)
_______________________________
GLOBAL INTERESTS
- Solving Sanctions Compliance and Due Diligence in Maritime Trade
- HMS Protector meets up with RRS Sir David Attenborough
- Damen shipyards Cape Town holds blessing ceremony for first IPV
- ★ The Fish We Eat are Eating Plastic (Editor – “Researchers don’t know very much about the effects of ingesting plastic on fish or humans.” includes 4:43 min video)
- IMO Urges Action to Combat Piracy in Gulf of Guinea
- Pirates Release Crew of Containership Mozart
- Security Takeover By NIMASA On Lagos Anchorage
- Stop Discharging Visible Floating Solids from Sewage in High Seas
- Ship Repair: A Financial Balancing Act (Editor – the realities of commercial ships)
- The First Mombasa Port Visit in Over a Decade by a U.S. Naval Vessel
_______________________________
SCUTTLEBUTT
- ★ RCMI Military History Night, Feb 11/21: Operation CHARIOT: the 1942 Raid on St Nazaire (Editor – one of our members Fraser McKee explains the Canadian content in one of the most famous raids in this 1:08:22 min video)
- Great Sea Fights: Cape St Vincent (1797) Part 1 – The Events (Editor – the first of three in a Mariner’s Mirror 27 min Podcast)
- ‘CANBERRA – A Berth In History’ (Editor – a transitional history of a special ship in this 1:05:42 min video)
- The Birth of Naval Aviation (Editor – history lesson in a 12:46 min video)
- Transporting A Retired HMCS Submarine 700 Miles Across Canada | Huge Moves | Spark (Editor – 44:50 min video)
__________________________________
SIGNIFICANT RCN DATES – FEBRUARY
(If you see any omissions or errors please inform me, and more modern significant dates are also welcome. The list draws primarily from the Directory of History and Heritage’s comprehensive “Significant Dates in Canadian Military History”, the now defunct “Canada Channel”, “Legion Magazine”, Roger Litwiller’s excellent website, the encyclopedic guidance of NAC member and author Fraser McKee, and anywhere else I can find credible information.)
- 1 February 1911 The first recruiting posters for the RCN are issued to post offices throughout Canada.
- 1 February 1968 The personnel and organization of the RCN, Canadian Army, and the Royal Canadian Air Force were unified into a single organization, the Canadian Forces.
- 5 February 1944 HMS Puncher, an aircraft carrier, is commissioned into the Royal Navy at Vancouver with a Canadian crew, but a British air complement.
- 6 February 6, 1943 – Italian aircraft attack and sink RCN Flower Class corvette HMCS Louisbourg east of Oran while she is escorting a convoy from Gibraltar to Bone, Algeria; 2 Officers, 35 crew, and 5 RN seaman are lost.
- 8 February 1943 HMCS Regina commanded by LCdr Harry Freeland, RCNR sinks the Italian submarine Avorio in the Mediterranean Sea.
- 10 February 1942 HMCS Spikenard is torpedoed by U136 and sunk in the North Atlantic. There were only 8 survivors and 57 perish.
- 14 February 1945 Five Motor Torpedo Boats (459, 461, 462, 465, 466) of the Canadian 29th Flotilla burn in Ostende harbour. 26 RCN crew are lost.
- 15 February 1965 The Maple Leaf becomes Canada’s official flag.
- 16 February 1945 HMCS St. John commanded by A/LCdr William R. Stacey, RCNR sinks the German submarine U-309 off the northeast coast of Scotland near Moray Firth.
- 18 February 1944 Sixteen Canadian minesweepers, in four divisions of four ships, begin to leave St. John’s for British waters to take part in the invasion of Normandy.
- 19 February 1944 Motor Torpedo boats of the 29th and 65th (Canadian) Flotillas began to be commissioned (continues until 31 March).
- 22 February 1943 – Operation Torch – RCN Flower Class corvette HMCS Weyburn strikes a mine laid by U-118 off the Strait of Gibraltar; the explosion kills one seaman of her crew of 77; before the ship sinks, all but two depth charges are rendered safe by throwing the detonators over the side; British destroyer HMS Wivern starts to remove the wounded and survivors when twenty minutes later an after bulkhead gives way and the corvette begins to sink; the two depth charges explode, killing 8 more sailors and wounding others in the water; Wivern’s engines and boilers are hit, leaving the ship dead in the water; 84 RCN and RN sailors are wounded in total. Gibraltar.
- 22 February 1945 HMCS Trentonian is torpedoed and sunk by a German submarine U1004 near Falmouth England, six of her ship’s company were lost.
- 24 February 1944 HMCS Waskesiu commanded by LCdr James P. Fraser, RCNR sank the German submarine U-257 in the North Atlantic.
- 27 February 1930 HMCS Thiepval is lost in Barkley Sound, British Columbia.
- 28 February 1946 HMCS Cornwallis is paid off (taken out of service) and new recruit training begins to be conducted at local naval depots.
- 28 February 1991 Operation Desert Storm, the combat phase of the Persian Gulf War ends.