More images of Rolldock Storm’s transit through the Singapore Strait this morning, carrying the Singapore navy’s Type 218SG Invincible-class submarine to home waters for the first time. The submarine, Impeccable, arrived here from Germany after slightly more than a month at sea.
RSS Unity, a Littoral Mission Vessel, escorted the heavy-lift ship. Rolldock Storm’s previous cargo, the submarine, Impeccable, was not visible to onlookers.
The Singapore Armed Forces appears to have implemented extensive protective security measures to screen the new submarine. Steel modules and containers were used to cover the hull and conning tower of the 70-metre long submarine.
Senang Diri believes these measures are unprecedented for a RSN submarine repatriation. They were not done some 20 years ago when the author wrote about the repatriation of the RSN’s last two Challenger-class boats.
In addition, the submarine transporter and her Singapore navy escort were noted to have deviated from the Eastbound lane of the Singapore Strait traffic separation scheme. This lane lies at the southern end of the strait.
H/T Timothy Liu for braving the hot weather this morning while on coast watch. The results, as you can tell, are worth the effort.
And here are images of Rolldock Storm in Kiel, Germany, in May this year as the ship was prepared for her voyage to Singapore.
True. Its a bit weird that the Mindef/RSN decides to hide the appearance of the Impeccable till this extend unless they don't want certain appearance or features of the Subs to be viewed by military bloggers/photographers like for example - Vertical launch system for the AsuV missile.
ReplyDeleteReminds me of Israel navy where their Dolphins and upcoming Dakar class SSK shares quite a few similarities with our Invincibles on the design like the inclusion of an "X-shaped" rudder configuration and submarine screw configuration reminiscent to that of the Type 218SG submarine and the Type 216 submarine concept.
Of course they are all designs from ThyssenKrupp Marine Systems and with SAF's close relationships with IDF i wouldn't be surprised if RSN had adopted certain very classified capabilities from them.