HMNZS Moa (P3553)

Career (New Zealand)
Namesake: HMNZS Moa (T233)
Builder: Whangarei Engineering and Construction Company
Commissioned: 28 Nov 1983
Decommissioned: 23 Jan 2007
Fate: decommissioned
General characteristics
Class and type: Moa-class inshore patrol vessel
Displacement: 91.5 ton standard; 105 ton full load
Length: 27 metres
Beam: 6.1 metres
Draught: 2.4 metres
Propulsion: Two Cummins diesels (710 hp) Twin shafts
Speed: 12 knots
Range: 3000 nm (6000 km)
Complement: 18: 5 Officers: 3 Senior Rates: 10 Ratings
Sensors and
processing systems:
Navigation Radar Racal Decca 916 I Band
Armament: 1 x 12.7mm MG

HMNZS Moa (P3553) was a Moa-class inshore patrol vessel of the Royal New Zealand Navy. It was commissioned in 1983 for the Naval Volunteer Reserve and decommissioned in 2007.

Moa was the second ship of this name to serve in the Royal New Zealand Navy and was named after the Moa bird from New Zealand.

After she was decommissioned in January 2007, she was sold on in March to a Picton builder who renamed the vessel Flightless. On Friday 20 June 2008 the vessel, moored at anchor on the eastern side of Waikawa Bay, Picton, was struck by a commercial fishing boat, with the loss of two lives aboard the fishing boat. (Paul Mulrooney, 'Two die in boat crash,' headline article, p. 1, Dominion Post, Saturday-Sunday, 21–22 June 2008)

See also