TSAMTO, February 16. Vice Admiral Paul Thomas, Deputy Commandant of the U.S. Coast Guard, and Andres Duran Aro, Ambassador of Uruguay to the United States, signed documents on the transfer of ownership rights to three Protector-class patrol boats to Uruguay.
According to the US Coast Guard, the ceremony took place in Washington (DC).
Admiral Jorge Wilson, Commander of the Uruguayan Navy, signed a letter accepting a proposal for the gratuitous supply of three Protector-class boats from the US Coast Guard on December 15, 2021, as part of an intergovernmental agreement between the United States and Uruguay. The transfer is carried out by the Coast Guard's Office of International Procurement under the Excess Defense Articles (EDA) program.
After the transfer, the boats will undergo maintenance, modernization and retrofitting at the US Coast Guard facility in Baltimore. Representatives of the Uruguayan Navy will be trained in the operation and maintenance of boats. After completing the training of personnel and work on the boats, they will go to the home port under the control of the crews of the Uruguayan Navy. The boats are expected to arrive in Uruguay in July 2022.
According to the Uruguayan Ambassador, the transferred Protector-class boats will replace two 95-foot Cape-class patrol boats transferred to Uruguay in 1990 under the EDA program. The service life of these vessels has exceeded 60 years.
The "Protector" class boats will be used to ensure safety at sea, conduct search and rescue operations, counter drug trafficking and illegal fishing.
The Deputy Commandant of the Coast Guard said that the Protector boats, 64 of which are still in service with the US Coast Guard, will be an effective complement to the Uruguayan Navy fleet.
As reported by TSAMTO, negotiations on the possibility of supplying the boats "Protector" to the Uruguayan Navy have been conducted since June 2020. On December 15, 2021, Admiral Jorge Wilson, Commander of the Uruguayan Navy, signed a letter accepting a proposal for the gratuitous supply of three Protector-class boats from the US Coast Guard under an intergovernmental agreement between the United States and Uruguay. The boats (WPB-87309) "Albacore", (WPD-87329) "Cochito" and (WPB-87334) "Genit" were adopted by the US Coast Guard in the period from 1999 to 2009.
The boats are planned to be located in the west of Uruguay, where a naval base is to be established in Fray Bentos.
The length of the Protector class boat, built by Bollinger Shipyards on the basis of the Damen Stan 2600 project, is 26.5 m (87 ft), the maximum width is 5.92 m, displacement is 91 tons, crew is 10 people. It is equipped with two MTU 8V 396 TE94 diesel engines and develops a maximum speed of 25 knots, a cruising range of 900 nautical miles. The armament consists of two 12.7 mm machine guns. Each boat is equipped with a rigid hull inflatable dinghy (RHIB).
