''Lieutenant de vaisseau Le Hénaff'' (F789) is a in the

French Navy The French Navy (french: Marine nationale, lit=National Navy), informally , is the maritime arm of the French Armed Forces and one of the five military service branches of France. It is among the largest and most powerful naval forces in t ...

Design

Armed by a crew of 90 sailors, these vessels have the reputation of being among the most difficult in bad weather. Their high windage makes them particularly sensitive to pitch and roll as soon as the sea is formed. Their armament, consequent for a vessel of this tonnage, allows them to manage a large spectrum of missions. During 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 ...

, they were primarily used to patrol the continental shelf of the

Atlantic Ocean The Atlantic Ocean is the second-largest of the world's five oceans, with an area of about . It covers approximately 20% of Earth's surface and about 29% of its water surface area. It is known to separate the " Old World" of Africa, Europe ...

in search of Soviet Navy submarines. Due to the poor performance of the hull sonar, as soon as an echo appeared, the reinforcement of an ASM frigate was necessary to chase it using its towed

variable depth sonar A towed array sonar is a system of hydrophones towed behind a submarine or a surface ship on a cable. Trailing the hydrophones behind the vessel, on a cable that can be kilometers long, keeps the array's sensors away from the ship's own noise sour ...

. Their role as patrollers now consists mainly of patrols and assistance missions, as well as participation in UN missions (blockades, flag checks) or similar marine policing tasks (fight against drugs, extraction of nationals, fisheries control, etc.). The mer-mer 38 or mer-mer 40 missiles have been landed, but they carry several machine guns and machine guns, more suited to their new missions. Its construction cost was estimated at 270,000,000

French francs The franc (, ; sign: F or Fr), also commonly distinguished as the (FF), was a currency of France. Between 1360 and 1641, it was the name of coins worth 1 livre tournois and it remained in common parlance as a term for this amount of money. It w ...

Construction and career

''Lieutenant de vaisseau Le Hénaff'' was

laid down Laying the keel or laying down is the formal recognition of the start of a ship's construction. It is often marked with a ceremony attended by dignitaries from the shipbuilding company and the ultimate owners of the ship. Keel laying is one o ...

in March 1977 at

Arsenal de Lorient Naval Group is a major French industrial Corporate group, group specialized in navy, naval defense industry, defense design, development and shipbuilding, construction. Its headquarters are located in Paris. Heir to the French naval dockyards i ...

Lorient Lorient (; ) is a town (''Communes of France, commune'') and Port, seaport in the Morbihan Departments of France, department of Brittany (administrative region), Brittany in western France. History Prehistory and classical antiquity Beginn ...

. Launched on 16 September 1978 and commissioned on 13 February 1980. On 5 March 2019, the ship left

Brest Brest may refer to: Places *Brest, Belarus **Brest Region **Brest Airport **Brest Fortress *Brest, Kyustendil Province, Bulgaria *Břest, Czech Republic *Brest, France **Arrondissement of Brest **Brest Bretagne Airport ** Château de Brest *Brest, ...

with her 100 crew members for the

Gulf of Guinea The Gulf of Guinea is the northeasternmost part of the tropical Atlantic Ocean from Cape Lopez in Gabon, north and west to Cape Palmas in Liberia. The intersection of the Equator and Prime Meridian (zero degrees latitude and longitude) is in the ...

. There she will relieve the amphibious assault ship Mistral as part of the Corymbe 146 mission. She was decommissioned on 31 July 2020.

Citations

{{DEFAULTSORT:Lieutenant de vaisseau Le Hénaff Ships built in Lorient 1978 ships D'Estienne d'Orves-class avisos