The Diplomat
The corvette Unayzah, the fifth and last be built by Navantia for the Royal Saudi Arabian Navy (RSNF), was launched yesterday at the shipyard in San Fernando (Cádiz), as part of a contract worth 1.8 billion euros.
The construction of the corvette began in April 2021 and eight months later it has been delivered to the Saudi Navy, which was represented at the ceremony by Commander Fahad Bin Abdullah Al-Ghofaily. On behalf of Navantia, the ceremony was presided over by its president, Ricardo Domínguez García-Baquero.
The corvette takes its name from a city in central Saudi Arabia, has a length of 104 metres, a beam of 14 metres and will be capable of carrying a total of 102 people between crew and passengers. It will be able to reach a maximum speed of 27 knots (50 kilometres per hour) and will have the capacity to carry 21 days’ worth of provisions on board.
The launching ceremony began with the reading of a few words from the Koran by a Saudi lieutenant, and with the anthems of Saudi Arabia and Spain.
The president of Navantia thanked the Saudi Navy for the trust placed in his company to build the five corvettes, and said that in reality, “it will not be the last”, as the company will continue to work for the Saudi Navy through other projects and orders.
Domínguez thanked Navantia’s workers for their work, indicating that, without their efforts, the launching ceremony would not have been possible and assuring their “total commitment to the future of this shipyard and to the industrial ecosystem of the Bay of Cádiz”.
In his speech, Commander Fahad Bin Abdullah Al-Ghofaily praised Navantia’s work in getting the corvette ready in less than a year and highlighted the work of the Spanish company’s engineers. He also expressed his gratitude for the training work of the crew, who will complete their “extensive training” in four weeks’ time.
The State Secretary for Trade, Xiana Méndez, congratulated the personnel who have made the construction of the five corvettes possible: “They are a source of pride for all of you, as they perfectly reflect Spain’s strong technological capabilities and the competitiveness of the Spanish defence industry, which you represent so perfectly”. “This is also Spain’s brand,” he remarked.
“We are very proud of this programme and of the five corvettes we have built here because they are a shining example of Spain’s solid technological capacity,” Méndez added.
The Admiral Chief of Staff of the Spanish Navy, Antonio Martorell, underlined the efficiency and technological capacity of the Spanish naval industry and pointed out that the launching ceremony was the result of a “deep friendship” between Spain and Saudi Arabia and of the understanding between their navies.
The launching was done with a bottle containing sacred water from Mecca and, moments later, the corvette slid down the slipway until it touched the water.
