RFA Argus off the coast of Devonport in 2007.
| |
History | |
---|---|
United Kingdom | |
Name | MV Contender Bezant |
Owner | Contender 2 Ltd (Sea Containers, Managers) |
Port of registry | Hamilton, Bermuda |
Builder | Società Italiana Ernesto Breda at Marghera |
Yard number | 293 |
Launched | 28 November 1980 |
Completed | 31 July 1981 |
Fate | Sold to Harland and Wolff, 1 March 1984 |
Notes | Requisitioned by Ministry of Defence, May 1982. Returned to owner, November 1982. |
United Kingdom | |
Name | RFA Argus |
Acquired | 18 March 1988 |
Commissioned | 1 June 1988 |
Renamed | 25 March 1987 |
Homeport | HMNB Devonport[1] |
Identification |
|
Motto | Occuli Omnium (Eyes of All) |
Honours and awards | Falkland Islands 1982 (as the MV Contender Bezant), Gulf War 1991, Bosnia War 1992, Kosovo War 1998, Ebola Crisis 2015 |
Status | In active service |
Badge | |
General characteristics | |
Type | Littoral strike ship; secondary functions: Role 3 casualty treatment/aviation training and support vessel |
Displacement | 28,081 tonnes |
Length | 175.1 m (574 ft 6 in) |
Beam | 30.4 m (99 ft 9 in) |
Draught | 8.1 m (26 ft 7 in) |
Propulsion | 2 × Lindholmen Pielstick 18 PC2.5V diesels, twin propellers; bow-thruster |
Speed | 18 knots (33 km/h) |
Range | 20,000 nautical miles at 10 knots |
Complement |
|
Sensors and processing systems |
|
Armament |
|
Aircraft carried | Three landing spots; capacity of up to nine Westland Merlin helicopters or equivalent mix of CH47 Chinooks, WAH-64 Apaches and/or AgustaWestland AW159 Wildcats[6] |
Aviation facilities | 1 Aircraft lift from Flight Deck to 4-Deck number 2 hangar, 4x hangars |
RFA Argus is a ship of the Royal Fleet Auxiliary operated by the Ministry of Defence under the Blue Ensign. Italian-built, Argus was formerly the container ship MV Contender Bezant. The ship was requisitioned in 1982 for service in the Falklands War and purchased outright in 1984 for a four-year conversion to an Aviation Training Ship, replacing RFA Engadine. In 1991, during the Gulf War, she was fitted with an extensive and fully functional hospital to assume the additional role of Primary Casualty Receiving Ship. In 2009, the PCRS role became the ship's primary function.[7] Argus is due to remain in service beyond 2030.[8] In July 2022 it was reported that the future Littoral Strike Role would be assumed by Argus after a refit to convert her to this role.[9] As of October 2023, Argus had started her deployment to serve as part of Littoral Response Group (South).[10]
In her secondary role as a primary casualty receiving ship, given she is an armed vessel and not painted in the required white with red crosses, the Geneva Convention does not permit her to be being officially classified as a hospital ship.[11][12] The ship's capabilities make her ideally suited to the humanitarian aid role and she has undertaken several of these missions. The Royal Navy has occasionally described her as a "support ship/helicopter carrier".[13]