The ''Admiral Petre Bărbuneanu''-class corvette (also known as the Tetal-I class by NATO) is a series of four

corvette A corvette is a small warship. It is traditionally the smallest class of vessel considered to be a proper (or " rated") warship. The warship class above the corvette is that of the frigate, while the class below was historically that of the slo ...

s designed and constructed for the Romanian Naval Forces primarily for anti-submarine warfare. Only two corvettes out of a total of the four are still in service. Designed and constructed in the 1980s, they are a product of the

Cold War The Cold War is a term commonly used to refer to a period of geopolitical tension between the United States and the Soviet Union and their respective allies, the Western Bloc and the Eastern Bloc. The term '' cold war'' is used because the ...

with their armament and sensors based on Soviet designs. This class of corvettes was superseded by the ''Rear-Admiral Eustațiu Sebastian'' (Tetal-II) class.

Design and description

The ''Admiral Petre Bărbuneanu'' class was based on the Soviet Navy's but designed in Romania to a smaller size, though retaining their anti-submarine warfare (ASW) role. They incorporated Soviet weapons and sensors into their design. Vessels of the class have a

full load displacement The displacement or displacement tonnage of a ship is its weight. As the term indicates, it is measured indirectly, using Archimedes' principle, by first calculating the volume of water displaced by the ship, then converting that value into wei ...

of and measure long with a

beam Beam may refer to: Streams of particles or energy *Light beam, or beam of light, a directional projection of light energy **Laser beam *Particle beam, a stream of charged or neutral particles **Charged particle beam, a spatially localized grou ...

of and a draught of . The ships are powered by four diesel engines driving four shafts creating . This gives the corvettes a maximum speed of . The vessels are armed with four Soviet-designed AK-276 /59 calibre guns in two twin

turrets Turret may refer to: * Turret (architecture), a small tower that projects above the wall of a building * Gun turret, a mechanism of a projectile-firing weapon * Objective turret, an indexable holder of multiple lenses in an optical microscope * M ...

with one turret situated forward and aft. The 76 mm guns have a range of and fire up to 90 rounds per minute. For

anti-aircraft Anti-aircraft warfare, counter-air or air defence forces is the battlespace response to aerial warfare, defined by NATO as "all measures designed to nullify or reduce the effectiveness of hostile air action".AAP-6 It includes surface based, ...

(AA) defence, the corvettes have four

AK-230 The AK-230 is a Soviet fully automatic naval twin 30 mm gun. Its primary function is anti-aircraft. It is mounted in an enclosed automatic turret and directed by radar. AK-230 is widely used, mounted on big warships as well as small craft. ...

/65 calibre AA guns in two twin mounts positioned aft, forward of the aft 76 mm turret. The 30 mm guns have a range of and can fire up to 500 rounds per minute. They also mount two single-mounted machine guns along the amidships. For ASW purposes, the ''Admiral Petre Bărbuneanu'' class mounts RBU 2500 16-tubed ASW rocket launchers that are trainable with a range of . The ships have four torpedo tubes in two twin mounts situated aft to either side of the aft 76 mm gun turret. They can fire Type 53-65 torpedoes which have a range of . ''Admiral Petre Bărbuneanu''-class corvettes are equipped with Soviet MR-302 (NATO reporting name: Strut Curve) air search/surface search radar, MR-104 ''Rys'' (NATO reporting name: Drum Tilt) and MR-105 ''Turel'' (NATO reporting name: Hawk Screech)

fire control radar A fire-control radar (FCR) is a radar that is designed specifically to provide information (mainly target azimuth, elevation angle, elevation, ranging, range and range rate) to a fire-control system in order to direct weapons such that they hit a ...

. They have Hercules MG-22 hull-mounted sonar for underwater search and two PK 16 chaff launchers and RW-23 (NATO reporting name: Watch Dog) electronic support measures. The corvettes have a complement of 98.

Ships in class

Construction and career

The vessels were constructed at the

Mangalia Mangalia (, tr, Mankalya), ancient Callatis ( el, Κάλλατις/Καλλατίς; other historical names: Pangalia, Panglicara, Tomisovara), is a city and a port on the coast of the Black Sea in the south-east of Constanța County, Northern D ...

Shipyard for the Romanian Naval Forces. The first ship to commission was ''Amiral Petre Bărbuneanu'' in 1983. Three more corvettes would follow before the project was terminated in 1987 in favour of a new design that incorporated a helicopter flight deck. In 2004, two of the corvettes, ''Vice-Amiral Vasile Urseanu'' and ''Vice-Amiral Vasile Scodrea'' were decommissioned. The remaining ships are based at

Constanța Constanța (, ; ; rup, Custantsa; bg, Кюстенджа, Kyustendzha, or bg, Констанца, Konstantsa, label=none; el, Κωνστάντζα, Kōnstántza, or el, Κωνστάντια, Kōnstántia, label=none; tr, Köstence), histo ...

Notes

Citations

References

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External links

World Navies Today
{{DEFAULTSORT:Admiral Petre Barbuneanu-class corvette Corvettes of the Romanian Naval Forces Corvette classes