Adelaide gets navy contracts

Adelaide in South Australia will become the home of Australian naval ship building following the latest defence contract. The Royal Australia Navy is to get three new air warfare destroyers and two landing ships – all Spanish designed – for a total cost of $11 billion.

The three Navantia F100 air warfare destroyers will be assembled in Adelaide by an alliance of Navantia, ASC (formerly the Australian Submarine Corporation), the Defence Materiel Organisation and Raytheon. The contract will generate thousands of jobs supporting shipbuilding

While the hulls of the two new Navantia-designed amphibious landing ships will be built in Spain, their superstructure and other equipment will be fitted out by defence company Tenix at its Melbourne shipyard. Premier Mike Rann also announced his government would invest a further $31 million in building a new air warfare destroyer system centre at Osborne, in Adelaide’s north-west.

Rann said the centre would accommodate defence and industry companies working together to bring the successful ship design to life. He also expressed hope that a fourth Spanish-designed warship would be built in Adelaide, on top of the three announced today. “We believe that the Spanish design offers enormous opportunities for a fourth ship rather than just three ships,” Rann told reporters.

“We will be certainly very strongly supporting the federal government making the decision for a fourth ship to be built which of course will bring even more benefits to South Australia.”