Royal Navy: "Proud moment" as new Type 31 warship HMS Venturer unveiled to the public for the first time

Inspiration-class frigate HMS Venturer emerged from the assembly hall at Rosyth dockyard today. All five of the Type 31 ships - which are due to replace their Type 23 counterparts - will be based in Portsmouth.

HMS Venturer’s Senior Naval Officer, Commander Chris Cozens, hailed the key moment where the General Purpose Frigate was shown from the Babcock International shipyard. He said: “The ship’s company have seen Venturer grow from the keel up inside the build hall, but this is the first time Babcock and the Royal Navy have been able to unveil this next-generation frigate to the public. This moment is taking the ship another step closer to where it is needed, contributing the UK’s security and prosperity.”

The construction of HMS Venturer has largely been hidden from the public courtesy of the building erected to construct her and her four sister ships. Shipbuilders at Babcock have done as much as they can indoors, so today they began preparing the 5,700-tonne vessel for her debut in the water by moving her outside using specially-designed transport cradles. It took nearly 12 hours to edge the 139m hull of the Inspiration-class vessel out of the hall and on to the neighbouring hardstanding.

Later this summer she will be lowered on a special barge and floated off into the dock at Rosyth to begin the installation and testing of systems, sensors and weapons. Shipwrights, sailors, engineers, welders, electricians, naval architects and others have spent hundreds of thousands of hours into the project. There are 1,400 people on site and others widely supporting the Type 31 programme.

Each ship is 60 per cent larger than the Type 23 counterpart, but can carry 120 sailors compared to up to 200. HMS Venturer’s Executive Warrant Officer Lee ‘Rattler’ Morgan hopes the public and his colleagues will be impressed by their first sight of the ship.

“As the first of the Royal Navy’s Inspiration-class frigates emerges into the limelight, the scale and opportunities provided by this ship are increasingly apparent,” he added. “For the ship’s company, the growing maturity of the build grows our own understanding, and encourages us to exploit new and innovate ways to crew and operate the platform. We have a keen desire to make this a ship that sailors want to serve in.”

The space vacated by HMS Venturer will be filled by HMS Formidable, the third ship in the programme. This assembly hall is large enough for two Type 31s can be built side-by-side, with work on HMS Active carrying on at good progress. Babcock CEO David Lockwood said it was a “proud moment” for everyone involved in the Type 31 project.

He added: “It reflects the hard work, dedication and exceptional skills of our workforce here in Rosyth. We set our sights across generations and these frigates are built with flexibility and through-life support in mind and will provide a highly capable platform for our brave service personnel wherever they serve in the world, for decades to come.”