Nautic Africa to deliver boarding craft to South African Navy

An artists concept of the Nautic 9 metre boarding boat

22 July 2015 by defenceWeb

Paramount Group company Nautic Africa is in the process of custom-developing five boarding craft for the South African Navy to meet its Project Carol requirements. The vessels will be delivered by December.

The craft are currently under development at Nautic Africa’s Cape Town facilities. Project Manager Pieter Heyneman said that, “Nautic always aims to raise the bar, and this project will be no different.” He added that the design brief for Project Carol required a state-of-the-art, fully-equipped, composite craft capable of providing superior performance under demanding conditions.

The result is a 9 metre epoxy infused vessel capable of reaching speeds of 38 knots via twin Volvo D4-260 diesel sterndrives. Capable of carrying 10 crew members, the mid-engined arrangement will offer in-house developed shock mitigating seating to operational crew, whilst the boarding party is accommodated aft, Nautic said.

Designed to be deployed from the Navy’s frigates, the solid fendered, self-righting capable boarding craft make provision for interfacing via a single-point lifting arrangement, customized to fit the pre-existing CSIR adapted Vest Davit launching cranes.

In addition, the vessels will be equipped with a suite of equipment including military specification tactical communications, navigation and tracking systems, touch screen glass cockpit instrumentation, keyless starting, automatic fire suppression, noise cancelling intercom, a drop-in ammunition locker, a customized gun mount pintle interface as well as a pre-heating umbilical cord system and more.

“The multi-purpose boarding craft will be deployed to perform safety and security functions, including boarding operations, intelligence support and rescue missions,” said James Fisher, CEO of Nautic Africa.

Project Carol, which has been in existence for several years, aims to procure small boats less than 60 metres in length for the SA Navy in the form of boarding boats, diving boats, riverine patrol boats, ship sea boats, ferries, sailing dinghies, an ocean racing yacht and associated trailers.