HMCS Terra Nova (DDE 259)
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| Career |  |
|
|---|---|---|
| Ordered: | ||
| Laid down: | 14 November 1952 | |
| Launched: | 1959 | |
| Commissioned: | 6 June 1959 | |
| Decommissioned: | 11 July 1997 | |
| Fate: | Laid up, Halifax Harbour (2007) | |
| General characteristics | ||
| Displacement: | 2,800 tons full load | |
| Length: | 111.56 meters | |
| Beam: | 12.80 meters | |
| Draught: | 4.27 meters | |
| Propulsion: | 2 shafts; 2 Babcock & Wilcox water tube boilers; 2 English Electric geared turbines, 30,000 shp | |
| Speed: | 28 knots | |
| Complement: | 214-249 | |
| Armament: | ||
| Aircraft: | None | |
| Motto: | ||
| Battle Honours: | Gulf and Kuwait 1991 | |
HMCS Terra Nova is a Canadian Restigouche-class destroyer escort. She was built in 1959. She underwent two refits, one in 1968 bringing her up to the Improved RESTIGOUCHE (IRE) class, and one more in 1984 bringing her up to the DELEX Restigouche Class. She was further upgraded and served in the 1991 Gulf War, where she led all Coalition ships in numbers of suspect ships boarded. Although the oldest of the three Canadian vessels in the Gulf during the 1991 war, Terra Nova was probably the most heavily armed -- Harpoon missiles, which she had never been designed to carry, had been hastily installed before sailing. Terra Nova was paid off on 11 July 1997.
Like all Cold War-era Canadian destroyers, she is named for a river, in this case the Terra Nova River in Newfoundland. The name of the river, in turn, comes from the Latin for Newfoundland. Uniquely among the Restigouche class, HMCS Terra Nova was the first to bear that name, although there was an earlier civilian ship Terra Nova, famed for her scientific exploration to Antarctica. Both the river and the Antarctic (as symbolized by a penguin) feature on the ship's badge of HMCS Terra Nova.
Terra Nova was the last of her class to be in service. After being paid off she appeared, cast as an American destroyer, in the movie K-19: The Widowmaker.
In December 2007, there was discussion about sinking Terra Nova as an "artificial reef" and diving attraction in the St. Lawrence River near Brockville, Ontario. If so, it would be the only Canadian naval vessel to have been sunk within Ontario provincial waters.
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