At 230.8m the Royal Australian Navy’s NUSHIP Canberra is the largest ship ever built for the Navy that can accommodate about 1400 soldiers and crew.
NUSHIP Canberra can transport 1,000 soliders, along with 400 crew members, accommodate 16 helicopters on it’s flight deck while the lower decks have room for 12 tanks and more than 100 trucks and numerous amphibious ships.
The construction of the hull, to the level of the flight deck, including the majority of the fitting out has been done Navantia’s Ferrol-Fene shipyard in Spain while the remainder of the construction is left with BAES’ Williamstown shipyard in Victoria.
NUSHIP Canberra is the first of two LHDs’ due to be commissioned by the navy in the coming years.
NUSHIP Canberra will be be commissioned as HMAS Canberra (LHD01) while the second will be known as HMAS Adelaide (LHD02).
The combined cost of Canberra and its sister ship, Adelaide, will be more than $3.1 billion.
BAES is currently testing NUSHIP Canberra off the coast of Sydney with some of the crew that will be piloting the ship.
The ship’s main roles within the Navy is to transport and deploy an embarked force (Army in the case of the ADF but could equally be an allied Army or Marines), along with their equipment and aviation units, and carry out support and humanitarian missions.
