HMNZS Waikato (F-55)
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Career (New Zealand) | |
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Name: | HMNZS Waikato (F-55) |
Namesake: | Waikato province of New Zealand |
Operator: | Royal New Zealand Navy |
Builder: | Harland and Wolff |
Laid down: | January 1964 |
Commissioned: | September 1966 |
Decommissioned: | 1998 |
Refit: | Major refit 1986-88 |
Homeport: | Devonport, Auckland |
Nickname: | The mighty Y |
Fate: | Sunk on 18 December 2000 as an artificial reef |
General characteristics | |
Class and type: | Leander class frigate |
Displacement: | 2,450 tons standard 3,200 tons full load |
Length: | 372 feet (113 m) |
Beam: | 41 feet (12 m) |
Draught: | 19 feet (6 m) |
Installed power: | 30,000 shp |
Propulsion: | 2 × Babcock and Wilcox boilers delivering steam to 2 x English Electric geared steam turbines, 30,000 shp to 2 shafts |
Speed: | 34 knots (63 km/h) |
Range: | 4,600 nautical miles (8,520 km) at 15 knots |
Complement: | 18+248 |
Sensors and processing systems: |
Type 965 air search radar |
Armament: | 2 × 4.5 in (114 mm) guns in twin Mk6 mounting 1 × quadruple Sea Cat SAM launcher 2 × Mark 32 torpedo tubes for Mark 46 torpedoes |
Aircraft carried: | Originally a Wasp helicopter, later a Kaman SH-2G |
HMNZS Waikato (F55) was a Leander Batch 2TA frigate of the Royal New Zealand Navy. She was one of two Leanders built for the RNZN the other being the Batch 3 HMNZS Canterbury. She was one of two New Zealand ships which relieved British ships of the Armilla patrol during the Falklands conflict freeing British ships for deployment.
The HMNZS Waikato was decommissioned from the Royal New Zealand Navy in 1998 and bought from the Government for $1. She was stripped in the Northland port of Opua and sunk off the coast of Tutukaka on 18 December 2000 as an artificial reef. In 2002, the sunken Waikato's bow was separated from the rest of the ship in heavy weather.
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