Navy gets its helicopters

Feb 27, 2003
Author: P&S

Approval has been given by government for the South African Navy to acquire four maritime helicopters for service with the corvette/frigates now on order from Blohm+Voss in Germany.

This was announced yesterday (Wednesday, 26 February 2003) during the national budget which was presented to the South African Parliament by finance minister Trevor Manuel, “to ensure full operational capability of the corvettes.”

The helicopters are thought likely to be Sea Lynx, which was the original choice of the navy. An order for these was scrapped by the cabinet in 1999 at the height of the controversy over the arms bill, presumably as an attempt to keep the costs of the procurement down, although navy personnel continued to insist that the helicopters would be acquired at a later date.

The cost of the four helicopters has been quoted at R1.1Bn.