Royal Navy decommissions survey ship HMS Echo

Photo: Royal Navy

The Royal Navy survey ship HMS Echo‘s 20-year career formally ended at a decommissioning ceremony at Portsmouth Naval Base on Thursday, June 30.

The vessel was the first of two Echo-class survey ships – alongside HMS Enterprise, which is still in service – designed for hydrographic and oceanographic operations across the world.

The 5,000-tonne ship was commissioned in Portsmouth but was based at Devonport Naval Base during two decades of service.

Echo‘s global deployments also saw the ship make some notable discoveries.

The ship discovered an uncharted sea mountain off the Yemen coast during two years of operations across the Middle and Far East around 2010. It also found the wreck of a Second World War cargo ship off the coast of Libya.


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