Philippine Navy celebrates 118th anniversary by commissioning new vessels

The Philippine Navy on Wednesday celebrated its 118th founding anniversary, highlighted by the commissioning of new vessels.

The Philippines has upgraded and modernized the equipment and capabilities of its navy by acquiring for Navy five naval helicopters, three multi-purpose attack craft, two frigates, two anti-submarine warfare capable helicopters, and a weather high endurance cutter.

The Navy has also recently acquired a new landing dock (LD) vessel, the BRP Tarlac and three new landing craft heavy (LCH) vessels which had been formally commissioned and christened in Manila.

The vessels will be used in transporting personnel, equipment, and aid during humanitarian assistance and disaster response operations, as well as in transporting troops from one operational area to another.

The BRP Tarlac (LD 601), which is the first strategic sealift vessel of the Navy that was acquired through the armed forces modernization program, was named after one of the eight provinces that revolted against the Spaniards during the colonization period.

Built by PT PAL Indonesia (Persero) in Surabaya, the design of BRP Tarlac was modelled after the Makassar-class Landing Platform Dock of the Indonesian Navy and measures 123 meters in length and 21 meters in width, with a payload capacity of 2,800 tons and a maximum speed of 16 knots.

The three LCHs, which are the supplementary vessels to two similar vessels that were previously donated by the Australian government, were christened BRP Waray (LC288), the group of people who were hard hit by Typhoon Yolanda; Iwak (LC289), an ethnic group in Nueva Viscaya province with the least number of population; and Agta (LC290), an endangered tribe in Southern Luzon. Endit