Canadian frigate rearmed in Darwin Port as allied war games continue

A Canadian warship has completed a complex manoeuvre in Darwin waters. Read what happened

The Australian Defence Force has assisted in the rearmament of a Canadian warship from Darwin Port, in a significant expansion of naval capability in northern Australia.

Part of Exercise Talisman Sabre 2025, HMCS Ville de Quebec was rearmed with RGM-84 Harpoon Block II missiles on two occasions on Monday morning.

Captain David Shervington, commanding officer at HMAS Coonawarra and senior naval officer for northern Australia, said the rearmament exercise was a measure of the ADF’s capacity to operate with other allied defence forces.

“Its incredibly important for us in the Royal Australian Navy, the Australian Defence Force, and also for our allies and partners to be able to conduct these rearmaments in northern Australia.

“This is the second time only that the Canadian Armed Forces have conducted a rearmament of a vessel in northern Australia. It’s significant in that most of munition storage facilities are located in the south of Australia, and so to be able to get up here and transfer them onto our military assets creates time and space for us when we need to project forces from the north of Australia.”

HMAS Coonawarra commander Captain David Shervington

Captain Shervington said the exercise was about national resilience and the ability to interact, engage and incorporate with industry partners, the NT Government, allies and friends to be able to support these activities.

“As the National Defence Strategy made clear, the ability to conduct operations from the north of Australia is incredibly important,” he said.

“We need to be able to conduct impactful projection from the north of Australia that is critical to both the Australian Navy, the Australian Defence Force, and also our allies and partners who operate in the Indo Pacific.

“All warships have different types of ammunition and munitions that are used across our allies and partners and the Australian Navy, and the ability to get those munitions up to Darwin and then onto a warship is quite complex.

HMCS Ville de Quebec Commander Peter McNeil.

“The supply chains are long, we need to be able to get them here in a timely fashion, store them and then we need to be able to put in place the safety to conduct that evolution and, depending on the size, of the munition that safety can be quite extensive.”

HMCS Ville de Quebec left its home port of Halifax, Nova Scotia in April for the seven-month deployment that will see the 132 m by 16 m frigate circumnavigate the globe by its return to port in November.

HMCS Ville de Quebec Commander Peter McNeil said the ship was deployed as part of Operation Horizon, Canada’s mission to increase its presence in the Indo Pacific.

Soldiers and fake protesters ‘clash’ outside RAAF Base Darwin.

“We’re an east coast ship out of Halifax, Nova Scotia with 240 sailors, 25 of which are women, and we’re here to operate with the local forces as we’re integrated into the UK Carrier Strike Group as a multinational task group deployed to this region.

“We don’t want to fire (live) missiles on an Australian range, so while we were here we embarked exercise missiles, which have been defuled to make sure they’re safer to operate in the range facilities.

“We embarked those missiles just over a week ago and went out and fired an exercise missile yesterday and have come back to disembark the second exercise missile and re-embark our wartime stockpile.

“That was all conducted seamlessly this morning and over a week ago when we embarked the other missiles. Outstanding we’re able to have that capability to work with our partners in the region and that we have those relationship we’re we can do rearmament sustainment while deployed this far from our home base.”

In other Defence news, a protest at the RAAF Base gates near the Winnellie water tower was held as part of Talisman Sabre.

Paid actors mixed with plain-clothed soldiers to mock-up an antimilitary protest, with soldiers deployed to keep the peace.

Originally published as Canadian frigate rearmed in Darwin Port as allied war games continue