The Type 837 tug with the

NATO reporting name NATO uses a system of code names, called reporting names, to denote military aircraft and other equipment used by post-Soviet states, former Warsaw Pact countries, China, and other countries. The system assists military communications by providi ...

Hujiu (沪救, meaning Shanghai Rescue in Chinese) is a type of ocean-going tug that

China China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. With population of China, a population exceeding 1.4 billion, it is the list of countries by population (United Nations), second-most populous country after ...

developed for the

People's Liberation Army Navy The People's Liberation Army Navy, also known as the People's Navy, PLA Navy or simply Chinese Navy, is the naval warfare military branch, branch of the People's Liberation Army, the national military of the People's Republic of China. It i ...

(PLAN). Out of a total of 20 ships built in the 1980s by the

Wuhu Wuhu () is a prefecture-level city in southeastern Anhui province of China, province, China. Sitting on the southeast bank of the Yangtze River, Wuhu borders Xuancheng to the southeast, Chizhou and Tongling to the southwest, Hefei City to the n ...

shipyard, 18 are still in PLAN service and all of them still remain active as of the early 2010s. One ship was exported to Bangladesh in 1984, and another was sold in 1995. The ships in the type 837 series in PLAN service are labeled with a combination of two Chinese characters followed by a three-digit number. The second Chinese character is Tuo (拖), meaning tug in Chinese, because these ships are tugs. The first Chinese character denotes which fleet the ship is in service with; for example, with East (Dong, 东) for

East Sea Fleet The Eastern Theater Command Navy (东部战区海军, ETCN) is a formation of China's People's Liberation Army Navy (PLAN) and the naval component of the Eastern Theater Command. The ETCN was reorganized from the East Sea Fleet (ESF) by 2016. C ...

, North (Bei, 北) for

North Sea Fleet The North Sea Fleet (NSF; ), concurrently the Northern Theater Command Navy (), is one of the three fleets of China's People's Liberation Army Navy. Headquartered in Qingdao, Shandong, the fleet provides naval forces to the Northern Theater Comma ...

, and South (Nan, 南) for

South Sea Fleet The Southern Theater Command Navy (STCN), or the South Sea Fleet (SSF) until 2018, is a formation of China's People's Liberation Army Navy (PLAN) and the naval component of the Southern Theater Command. History In December 1949, the Fourth Fi ...

. However, the pennant numbers may have changed due to the change of Chinese naval ships naming convention. Specification:Type 837
/ref> *Length (m): 60.2 *Beam (m): 11.6 *Draft (m): 4.4 *Displacement (t): 1470 *Speed (kn): 15 *Rang (nmi): 2200 @ 13 kn *Crew: 50 *Propulsion: two LVP

diesel engine The diesel engine, named after the German engineer Rudolf Diesel, is an internal combustion engine in which Combustion, ignition of diesel fuel is caused by the elevated temperature of the air in the cylinder due to Mechanics, mechanical Compr ...

s @ 1800 hp *Armament: Provisions for heavy machine guns

References

{{Ship classes of the Chinese Navy, state=uncollapsed Auxiliary ships of the People's Liberation Army Navy Tugboats of the People's Liberation Army Navy Auxiliary tugboat classes