Sahand – Iran's new naval frigate began service

Sahand wears number 74 – the same as the frigate of the same name sunk by the US Navy in 1988 during Operation Praying Mantis. It is worth adding that the previous ship belonged to the British type of light frigate Alvand/Vosper V, from which the Iranian type Moudge evolved. Sahand's frigate hull was redesigned to make the ship harder to detect for radar. According to official declarations of the Iranian military, this reduced the likelihood of detection by 30%. Sahand is also expected to have much more powerful weapons, electronic combat systems, operating beams and maneuverability, resulting in its combat capabilities being "twice as much" as in the case of Jamaican. In this situation, and also given that Sahand's buoyancy is estimated at between 2000 and 2500 tonnes, and the previous two units were displaced by 1500 tonnes, it is difficult to even say that we have to deal with units of the same type, or rather with a ship belonging to a new type created by developing the Moudge type.

From officially available information, the new ship is armed with a single 76 mm automatic cannon, six 324 mm light torpedoes in two three-chamber launchers, 20 mm point defense cannon of the Kamand system and, possibly, two Merhad anti-aircraft missiles (equivalent to the US SM-1), and four Ghadir anti-ship missiles (300 km range) or Nour (170 km). The ship can also carry one helicopter. According to official information, Iran planned to jointly build seven Moudge frigates. In addition to the three devoted to the service, Den's most advanced frigate is built in Bandar Abbas, and the other three are in different stages of construction.

Signature: ms