HMS ''Battleaxe'' was a

Type 22 frigate The Type 22 frigate also known as the ''Broadsword'' class was a class of frigates built for the British Royal Navy. Fourteen were built in total, with production divided into three batches. Initially intended to be anti-submarine warfare fri ...

of the British

Royal Navy The Royal Navy (RN) is the United Kingdom's naval warfare force. Although warships were used by English and Scottish kings from the early medieval period, the first major maritime engagements were fought in the Hundred Years' War against ...

. She was sold to the

Brazilian Navy ) , colors= Blue and white , colors_label= Colors , march= "Cisne Branco" ( en, "White Swan") (same name as training ship ''Cisne Branco'' , mascot= , equipment= 1 multipurpose aircraft carrier7 submarines6 frigates2 corvettes4 amphibious war ...

on 30 April 1997 and renamed ''Rademaker''.

Construction and design

''Battleaxe'' was ordered by the British Admiralty on 4 September 1974, as the second Batch I Type 22 Frigate. The ship 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 ...

Yarrow Shipbuilders Yarrow Shipbuilders Limited (YSL), often styled as simply Yarrows, was a major shipbuilding firm based in the Scotstoun district of Glasgow on the River Clyde. It is now part of BAE Systems Surface Ships, owned by BAE Systems, which has also op ...

' Scotstoun shipyard on 4 February 1976, and was launched by

Audrey Callaghan Audrey Elizabeth Callaghan, Baroness Callaghan of Cardiff (; 28 July 1915 – 15 March 2005) was the wife of British Labour prime minister James Callaghan. She served as a Labour councillor and later became a campaigner and fundraiser for ...

, the wife of James Callaghan, the

Prime Minister A prime minister, premier or chief of cabinet is the head of the cabinet and the leader of the ministers in the executive branch of government, often in a parliamentary or semi-presidential system. Under those systems, a prime minister i ...

at the time, on 18 May 1977. ''Battleaxe'' was completed on 28 March 1980. ''Battleaxe'' was

long overall __NOTOC__ Length overall (LOA, o/a, o.a. or oa) is the maximum length of a vessel's hull measured parallel to the waterline. This length is important while docking the ship. It is the most commonly used way of expressing the size of a ship, an ...

and at the waterline, with a beam of and a draught of .

Displacement Displacement may refer to: Physical sciences Mathematics and Physics * Displacement (geometry), is the difference between the final and initial position of a point trajectory (for instance, the center of mass of a moving object). The actual path ...

was standard and deep load. She was powered by two

Rolls-Royce Olympus The Rolls-Royce Olympus (originally the Bristol B.E.10 Olympus) was the world's second two- spool axial-flow turbojet aircraft engine design, first run in May 1950 and preceded only by the Pratt & Whitney J57, first-run in January 1950. It is ...

TM3B

gas turbine A gas turbine, also called a combustion turbine, is a type of continuous flow internal combustion engine. The main parts common to all gas turbine engines form the power-producing part (known as the gas generator or core) and are, in the directio ...

s rated at a total of and two

Rolls-Royce Tyne The Rolls-Royce RB.109 Tyne is a twin-shaft turboprop engine developed in the mid to late 1950s by Rolls-Royce Limited to a requirement for the Vickers Vanguard airliner. It was first test flown during 1956 in the nose of a modified Avro Linc ...

R1MC turbines rated at a total of , driving two shafts in a

Combined gas or gas Combined gas or gas (COGOG) is a propulsion system for ships using gas turbine engines. A high efficiency, low output turbine is used for cruising speeds with a high output turbine being used for high-speed operations. A clutch allows either turb ...

(COGOG) arrangement. They gave a speed of when powered by the Olympuses and when powered by the Tynes. The ship had a range of at . Anti-aircraft armament consisted of two sextuple Sea Wolf surface-to-air missile launchers, one forward of the

bridge A bridge is a structure built to span a physical obstacle (such as a body of water, valley, road, or rail) without blocking the way underneath. It is constructed for the purpose of providing passage over the obstacle, which is usually somethi ...

, and one on the roof of the helicopter

hangar A hangar is a building or structure designed to hold aircraft or spacecraft. Hangars are built of metal, wood, or concrete. The word ''hangar'' comes from Middle French ''hanghart'' ("enclosure near a house"), of Germanic origin, from Frankish ...

. Four

Exocet The Exocet () is a French-built anti-ship missile whose various versions can be launched from surface vessels, submarines, helicopters and fixed-wing aircraft. Etymology The missile's name was given by M. Guillot, then the technical director ...

MM-38

anti-ship missile An anti-ship missile (AShM) is a guided missile that is designed for use against ships and large boats. Most anti-ship missiles are of the sea skimming variety, and many use a combination of inertial guidance and active radar homing. A goo ...

s were fitted on the

forecastle The forecastle ( ; contracted as fo'c'sle or fo'c's'le) is the upper deck of a sailing ship forward of the foremast, or, historically, the forward part of a ship with the sailors' living quarters. Related to the latter meaning is the phrase " be ...

. Gun armament was limited to a pair of Bofors guns, mainly for peacetime patrol duties. A hangar and

flight deck The flight deck of an aircraft carrier is the surface from which its aircraft take off and land, essentially a miniature airfield at sea. On smaller naval ships which do not have aviation as a primary mission, the landing area for helicopte ...

was fitted aft, allowing the ship to operate two

Westland Lynx The Westland Lynx is a British multi-purpose twin-engined military helicopter designed and built by Westland Helicopters at its factory in Yeovil. Originally intended as a utility craft for both civil and naval usage, military interest led t ...

helicopters, which could carry anti-submarine

torpedo A modern torpedo is an underwater ranged weapon launched above or below the water surface, self-propelled towards a target, and with an explosive warhead designed to detonate either on contact with or in proximity to the target. Historically, s ...

es, while close-in anti-submarine armament was two triple STWS-1

torpedo tube A torpedo tube is a cylindrical device for launching torpedoes. There are two main types of torpedo tube: underwater tubes fitted to submarines and some surface ships, and deck-mounted units (also referred to as torpedo launchers) installed aboa ...

Operational history

Royal Navy

''Battleaxe'' was at

Gibraltar ) , anthem = " God Save the King" , song = " Gibraltar Anthem" , image_map = Gibraltar location in Europe.svg , map_alt = Location of Gibraltar in Europe , map_caption = United Kingdom shown in pale green , mapsize = , image_map2 = Gib ...

on 24 March 1982, as part of Exercise "Springtrain 82", but when the Falklands War broke out in April that year, she, unlike sister ships and , did not deploy to the South Atlantic as she was suffering from problems with her propeller shafts. ''Battleaxe'' did deploy to the South Atlantic shortly after the end of the war, however, escorting the aircraft carrier , leaving Devonport on 2 August, reaching the vicinity of the Falklands on 24 August and returning to Britain on 19 November. She was deployed to the South Atlantic again from July 1983 to December 1983. On 2 July 1988, ''Battleaxe'' rescued the stricken sailors from the

yacht A yacht is a sailing or power vessel used for pleasure, cruising, or racing. There is no standard definition, though the term generally applies to vessels with a cabin intended for overnight use. To be termed a , as opposed to a , such a pleasu ...

''Dalriada'', which had sunk after colliding with the submarine 's periscope. ''Battleaxe'' was deployed on the Armilla patrol, the Royal Navy's standing deployment in the

Persian Gulf The Persian Gulf ( fa, خلیج فارس, translit=xalij-e fârs, lit=Gulf of Fars, ), sometimes called the ( ar, اَلْخَلِيْجُ ٱلْعَرَبِيُّ, Al-Khalīj al-ˁArabī), is a mediterranean sea in Western Asia. The bod ...

in August 1990 when Iraq invaded Kuwait. She returned to Plymouth in November 1990.

Brazil

''Rademaker'' was involved in an unfortunate incident on 29 November 2004, during the annual FRATERNO naval exercise with ships of the Argentinian Navy. While conducting gunnery practice against target drones, a malfunction of the Argentinian frigate 's automatic weapons system caused her to fire on ''Rademaker''; four Brazilian crewmen were injured together with an Argentine naval observer. The ship suffered moderate damage. Also in 2004, ''Rademaker'' deployed to Port-au-Prince, as part of the United Nations Stabilization Mission in Haiti. In April 2017, ''Rademaker'' was involved in the search for the missing

bulk carrier A bulk carrier or bulker is a merchant ship specially designed to transport unpackaged bulk cargo — such as grains, coal, ore, steel coils, and cement — in its cargo holds. Since the first specialized bulk carrier was built in 1852, eco ...

after she disappeared in the Atlantic. ''Rademaker'' joined the international efforts to locate the missing Argentine submarine in November 2017.

References

Publications

* * * * * * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Battleaxe (F89) Ships built on the River Clyde 1977 ships Type 22 frigates of the Royal Navy Type 22 frigates of the Brazilian Navy Gulf War ships of the United Kingdom