Colbert (C 611)

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Career

Ordered:	1953
Laid down:	December 1953
Launched:	24 March 1956 in Brest
Commissioned:	5 May 1959
Decommissioned:	May 1991
Fate:	Scrapping scheduled for 2010
Struck:	1991
General characteristics
Displacement:	11,093 tonnes
Length:	180.47 m
Draft	7.90 m
Beam:	20.31 m
Propulsion:	2 TE CEM-Parsons groupes
Speed:	31 knots
Range:	4,000 nautical miles (7,400 km) at 25 knots.
Complement:	Original version: 70 officers 19 chief masters 52 masters 108 aid masters 748 quarter-masters and sailors 2 400 men Missile cruiser version 25 officers 208 petty officers 329 quarter-masters and sailors 500 men
Armament:	Original version: 16 × 127 mm AA guns 20 × 57 mm mod 51 guns Missile cruiser version: 4 MM-38 Exocet systems 1 Masurca* system 2 100 mm AA guns 12 × 57 mm mod 51 guns 2 × 12,7 mm AA
Planes	1 helicopter
Motto:

The C611 Colbert was an anti-air cruiser, later transformed into a missile cruiser, of the French Navy. She was the sixth warship to be named after Jean Baptiste Colbert.

Launched on 24 March 1956 in Brest, France, she was the second of the series of the De Grasse, and became the flagship of the squadron of the Mediterranean Sea in Toulon. In June 1967, she ferried General De Gaulle to Canada (on the occasion of his famous "Vive le Québec libre speech").

Between 1970 and 1972, she undertook extensive modifications in Brest to become a missile cruiser. Her only war mission was the Gulf War (operation "Salamandre") just before she was decommissioned.

Between 1993 and 2007, she was a museum in Bordeaux. But financial problems and opposition from citizens of Bordeaux forced the museum to close. She was towed in May 2007 to join the mothball fleet in Landevennec. She may be scrapped in 2010.