French Warships: The Type F70 AA frigate Cassard

The Type F70 AA or Cassard-class of air defence destroyers were built on similar hulls to that used for the Georges Leygues-class of anti-submarine destroyers.

It was originally intended that four ships of this class would be constructed, but only two – Cassard (D614) and Jean Bart (D615) – were built. They were built between 1982 and 1991, and are scheduled to remain in service until the mid 2020s.

Their characteristics are:

• Displacement: 4,500 tons
• Dimensions:
• Length: 465ft (139m)
• Beam: 46ft (14m)
• Draught: 21ft (6.5m)
• Propulsion: 4 × SEMT Pielstick 18PA6-V280 BTC diesel engines driving 2 shafts
• Speed: 29.5 knots
• Range: 8,000 nautical miles at 17 knots
• Complement: 250
• Sensors and processing systems: Thomson-CSF ARBR 17B radar warning; DIBV 1A Vampir; Thomson-CSF DRBJ 11B air search radar; Thomson-CSF DRBV 26C; 2 × Racal DRBN 34A navigational radar; Thomson-CSF DRBC 33A fire control system for the guns; 2 × Raytheon SPG-51C fire control system for the missiles; Thomson Sintra DUBA 25A sonar; SENIT 68 combat data system; Syracuse 2 SATCOM; OPSMER command support system
• Electronic warfare and decoys: Thomson-CSF ARBB-33 jammer
• Armament: 1 × Mk 13 launcher armed with 40 × Standard SM-1MR surface-to-air missiles; 8 × MM40 Exocet anti-ship missiles; 2 × fixed torpedo tubes armed with 10 × L5 mod 4 torpedoes); 1 × Creusot-Loire Compact 100 mm/55 Mod 68 DP gun; 2 × 20 mm F2 anti-aircraft guns; 4 × 12.7 mm machine guns; 2 × Sadral sextuple launcher armed with 39 × Mistral CIWS anti-air missiles
• Aircraft: 1 × Eurocopter AS 565 Panther anti-submarine helicopter