TSAMTO, July 15. According to the German Defense Ministry, on July 13 at the naval base in Wilhelmshaven, a ceremony was held for the commissioning of the German Navy frigate F225 "Rhineland-Palatinate" project F125.
The Rhineland-Palatinate F225 is the fourth and last of four Project F125 frigates built by the ARGE F125 consortium for the German Navy. Like the previously delivered ships, it became part of the 4th frigate Squadron of the German Navy.
As reported by TSAMTO, the Federal Department of Defense Technologies and Procurement (BWB – now BAAINBw) of Germany in June 2007 signed a contract with the ARGE F125 consortium (Arbeitsgemeinschaft Fregatte 125) for the construction of four F125 frigates for the country's Navy. The estimated cost of the program is 2.69 billion. euro. Frigates were supposed to be delivered to the Navy from 2017 to 2020 .
The laying of the keel of the lead frigate of the series, F222 Baden-Württemberg, took place on November 2, 2011. Due to problems with the integration of complex equipment, the ship's delivery dates were disrupted. As a result, the Baden-Württemberg was handed over to the customer at the end of April 2019 and adopted by the German Navy in June of the same year. The second frigate of the series, the Nordrain-Westphalen, entered the fleet on June 10, 2020, and the third, the Sachsen-Anhalt, on May 17, 2021.
The laying of the F225 "Rhineland-Palatinate" took place on January 29, 2015 at the Lurssen company in Hamburg. The baptism ceremony was held on May 24, 2017. The ship was transferred to the German Navy on January 28, 2022.
It is expected that the intended use of F125-class frigates will begin in mid-2023.
The ARGE F125 consortium includes ThyssenKrupp Marine Systems and the Bremen-based NVL Group (formerly Lurssen Defence). The bow sections were built by NVL in Bremen and Wolgast. The construction of the aft sections, final assembly, equipping and testing were carried out by NVL Blohm+Voss in Hamburg under the leadership of Thyssenkrupp Marine Systems.
Four F125-class frigates will replace eight F122-class frigates (Bremen). The F125s are specially designed to perform combat missions in the conditions of modern and prospective conflicts and are designed both to ensure national defense and to participate in multinational peacekeeping operations, crisis prevention, stabilization, combating piracy, countering terrorism and asymmetric threats, and supporting humanitarian operations. In addition, the frigate is capable of providing fire support to forces on the coast, anti-ship warfare, support for the actions of special operations forces and evacuation operations, as well as the work of staff groups.
