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French frigate La Motte-Picquet (D645)
La Motte-Picquet
Career (France)
Name: La Motte-Picquet
Builder: Brest arsenal
Laid down: 12 February 1982
Launched: 6 February 1985
Commissioned: 18 February 1988
Status: in active service, as of 2025
General characteristics
Class & type: Georges Leygues-class frigate
Displacement: 3,550 t (3,494 long tons)
4,500 t (4,429 long tons) full load
Length: 139 m (456 ft 0 in)
Beam: 14 m (45 ft 11 in)
Height: 39.36 m (129 ft 2 in)
Draught: 5.8 m (19 ft 0 in)
Propulsion: CODOG
2 × Pielstick PA 6 V280 STD diesels, 5,200 hp (3,878 kW)
2 × Rolls Royce Olympus TM3B gas turbines, 26,000 hp (19,388 kW)
2 shafts with 4-blade controllable pitch propellers
Speed: 30 knots (35 mph; 56 km/h) on gas turbines
21 knots (24 mph; 39 km/h) on diesels
Range: 1,000 nmi (1,900 km) at 30 kn (35 mph; 56 km/h) on gas turbines
10,000 nmi (19,000 km) at 15 kn (17 mph; 28 km/h) on diesels
Complement: 20 officers
120 non-commissioned officers
95 men
Sensors and
processing systems:
Detection:
• 1 Air/surface sentry radar DRBV51C
• 1 Air sentry radar DRBV 26
• 1 Fire control radar DRBC 32E
• 2 Navigation radar KH 1007
• 1 Hull sonar DUBV 23
• 1 Towed sonar DUBV 43C
Tactical information:
• SENIT 4
• SEAO/OPSMER
Electronic warfare
& decoys:
• 2 Radar interceptors ARBR 16
• 2 × Syllex chaff launchers
Armament: Anti-air:
• 1 × Crotale EDIR system - 8 missiles on launcher + 18 stored
• 2 × Simbad systems - 2×2 Mistral missiles
• 1 × CADAM 100 mm main gun
• 2 × 20 mm guns
• 4 × 12.7 mm machine guns
Anti-surface:
• 4 × Exocet MM38 missiles
Anti-submarine:
• 10 × L5 Mod4 torpedoes
• 2 × L5 torpedo launchers
Aircraft carried: 2 × Lynx WG13 Mk.4 helicopters, each with:
• 1 × DUAV4 sonar
• Rheseda system for transmission of acoustic data
• 12 × Mark 46 torpedoes

La Motte-Picquet is a F70 type anti-submarine frigate of the French Marine Nationale. She is the fourth French vessel named after the 18th Century admiral count Toussaint-Guillaume Picquet de la Motte. As of January 2012 she is serving in the Persian Gulf.

On 22 August 2007, she took custody of the Danish freighter Danica White which had been captured by pirates on the 3 June.

2011/12 tour[]

She left Brest on 9 November 2011 for active duty in the Indian Ocean and was refuelled by the US replenishment ship USNS Patuxent on 10 January 2012.[1] On 22 January she passed through the Straits of Hormuz with the British frigate HMS Argyll (F231) and a US battlegroup centred on the USS Abraham Lincoln (CVN-72).[2]

References[]

External links[]


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