HMCS Huron Sunk

[Jarrod David]

Here is updated info courtesy of the Canadian Press.

Canadian Press
Published: Monday, May 14, 2007
 
   
 VICTORIA (CP) - A Canadian warship has been sunk by artillery fire.

The Canadian navy spent more than $7 million cleaning up the decommissioned HMCS Huron to ready it for its final voyage and to ensure that nothing toxic was left aboard.

It took two days to tow the engineless, weaponless hulk to a spot about 100 kilometres off the coast of Vancouver Island and then only five hours to send it two kilometres straight down to the bottom of the Pacific Ocean.

Lt.-Cmdr. Mark MacIntyre says the Huron sank just after 1 p.m. local time as part of a joint, international naval exercise.

He says the navy and air force, as well as allies from the United States, got some very realistic training.

Originally plans were to have the warship targeted by naval gunnery, then hit by missiles and at least one submarine-launched torpedo.

But MacIntyre says that proved unnecessary since the ship was sent to the bottom by the barrage of artillery.

[Les bateaux du Qu]

Thanks for this news Jarrod, a sad news indeed.  What a surprise to learn that this ship was already at the end of its life.  I thought the refit of the 90's had made them i-tech class destroyer. Will they replace it by a new class of destroyers?  They could have rather bring it back home, to its'buider, marine industrie limited, sorel, to make a museum with it!?
Thanks again

[Michael Martin]

From the  Canadian Tribal Association:

"As a result of not being able to recruit a sufficient amount of crew, Huron was laid up in reserve in Esquimalt in November of 2000 after she sailed for the last time on October  23. On November 7, 2003, the navy announced she will be taken out of service mainly as a result of underfunding.  According to V-Adm Ron Buck, "To return Huron to operational service would require massive O and M resources which would greatly impact our ability to maintain the remainder of the fleet and is not the best use of resources."

Underfunding. And today the tories are backing off on their promise of three heavy, armed icebreakers and trying to peddle the idea of six boats with some basic ice strengthening. Hmmph...they must have choked when came time to write the cheque. $3 Billion is quite a bit for three vessels. I don't know what they expected...three armed heavy icebreakers just don't grow on trees.

[Timsen]

at least, getting a watery grave is always better as being scrapped for a ship. It thus creates new life as a habitat.

[Michael Martin]

Understandable sentiment but every time we recycle steel and iron it reduces the amount of iron ore that needs to be mined, the most common type being open pit strip mining. A quick figure from 2000 has world production of pig iron (a main component of further steel refinement) at 572 million tons. To get that, 1100 Million tons of ore is extracted. Just like how the paper industry has changed so that the process of paper product relies heavily on recycled paper products, the steel industry is much the same but needs to get a higher percentage of scrap steel into the process. Recycling is the way to go. This is not to preclude the use of vessels as artificial reefs which is also a very favorable use of old vessels. It's not like they will be laying down dozens of ship's on the ocean floor, one here and there is a good move.

Unfortunately in this case the Huron was blasted by quite a bit of modern ordnance, made up of heavy metals and sometimes lovely stuff like depleted uranium...not exactly the kind of stuff that help fosters new life. The reef idea is good, but you need to scuttle the ship. Maybe the ammo has a best before date on it, so the Navy decided to use it before they lose it.  :lol:

[Jarrod David]

Here is a link for some photos of HMCS Huron sinkex.

http://www.combatcamera.forces.gc.ca/netpub/server.np?quickfind&site=combatcamera&catalog=photos&template=results_e.np&sorton=IPTC%20-%20DateCreated&ascending=0

Take Care
Jarrod

[Michael Martin]

This Google map image is taken near Esquimalt, British Columbia. Would I be correct in assuming this is the Huron?

[Andrew Lester]

No, actually that's the former HMCS Annapolis.

[Michael Martin]

Yep, I should have done a more thorough search of the area. I'll see if I can find a google map of Huron later.