LÉ ''Samuel Beckett'' (P61) is a (OPV) of the Irish Naval Service. The ship was launched in November 2013 and commissioned in May 2014. She is named after Irish playwright and author

Samuel Beckett Samuel Barclay Beckett (; 13 April 1906 – 22 December 1989) was an Irish writer of novels, plays, short stories, and poems. Writing in both English and French, his literary and theatrical work features bleak, impersonal, and Tragicomedy, tra ...

. Like other OPVs in the Irish Naval Service, the ship's primary mission is fisheries protection,

search and rescue Search and rescue (SAR) is the search for and provision of aid to people who are in distress or imminent danger. The general field of search and rescue includes many specialty sub-fields, typically determined by the type of terrain the search ...

, and maritime protection operations, including vessel boardings.

Development

Design

In October 2010, the Irish Naval Service ordered a number of new offshore patrol vessels from Babcock Marine, a UK-based shipbuilder operating out of Appledore, North Devon. The first two vessels were named ''Samuel Beckett'' and respectively, and planned to replace (decommissioned September 2013; sold October 2013) and (decommissioned January 2015; commissioned in the

Maritime Squadron of the Armed Forces of Malta The Maritime Squadron of the Armed Forces of Malta () is the naval component of the Armed Forces of Malta, Maltese military. The Maritime Squadron has responsibility for the security of Malta, Maltese territorial waters, maritime surveillance a ...

June 2015). Like the ''Róisín''-class OPV, ''Samuel Beckett'' was designed by Vard Marine to a VARD 7 series design. Although similar to the ''Róisín''-class OPV, ''Samuel Beckett'' is over longer, intended to increase its capabilities in the rough waters of the North Atlantic. The ship is designed to carry a crew of 44 and have space for up to 10 trainees. Additionally, ''Samuel Beckett'' is designed to carry remotely operated submersibles and a decompression chamber for divers. The expanded deck area would allow the ship to deploy unmanned surveillance planes.

Construction and naming

Although the ship was built using modern modular construction techniques, the

keel The keel is the bottom-most longitudinal structural element of a watercraft, important for stability. On some sailboats, it may have a fluid dynamics, hydrodynamic and counterbalancing purpose as well. The keel laying, laying of the keel is often ...

was deemed to have been "laid down" during a keel-laying ceremony held at the Appledore Shipbuilding Yard on 19 May 2012 after the first two major components were connected together. In July 2013, while still under construction, the name of the vessel, ''Samuel Beckett'' was announced by the Minister for Defence

Alan Shatter Alan Joseph Shatter (born 14 February 1951) is an Irish lawyer, author and former Fine Gael politician who served as Minister for Justice and Equality and Minister for Defence from 2011 to 2014. He was a Teachta Dála (TD) for the Dublin S ...

Dáil Éireann Dáil Éireann ( ; , ) is the lower house and principal chamber of the Oireachtas, which also includes the president of Ireland and a senate called Seanad Éireann.Article 15.1.2° of the Constitution of Ireland reads: "The Oireachtas shall co ...

Propulsion

The ship is powered by a pair of 16-cylinder W16V26F

Wärtsilä Wärtsilä Oyj Abp (), trading internationally as Wärtsilä Corporation, is a Finnish corporation, Finnish company which manufactures and services power sources and other equipment in the Marine propulsion, marine and energy markets. The core ...

diesel motors driving twin shafts that can propel the vessel to a top speed of . The ship is also equipped with dynamic positioning systems and a power take-in (PTI) drive, to enable fuel savings as the main engines can be shut down and switched to alternative power sources such as stored battery power or a smaller more economical engine.

Operational history

The ship was completed and floated out of the shipyard in November 2013, delivered in April 2014 and commissioned for service in May 2014. The vessel was "twinned" with

Cork city Cork ( ; from , meaning 'marsh') is the second-largest city in Republic of Ireland, Ireland, the county town of County Cork, the largest city in the Provinces of Ireland, province of Munster and the List of settlements on the island of Ireland ...

in a ceremony held on 7 June 2014. In late 2015 ''Samuel Beckett'' was deployed to the

Mediterranean The Mediterranean Sea ( ) is a sea connected to the Atlantic Ocean, surrounded by the Mediterranean basin and almost completely enclosed by land: on the east by the Levant in West Asia, on the north by Anatolia in West Asia and Southern ...

as part of Ireland's contribution to the humanitarian response to the

European migrant crisis The 2015 European migrant crisis was a period of significantly increased movement of refugees and Human migration, migrants into Europe, mostly from the Middle East. An estimated 1.3 million people came to the continent to request Right of asyl ...

. During the ship's cruise, more than 1,000 migrants were rescued. In one event, 111 people were rescued in a

United Nations The United Nations (UN) is the Earth, global intergovernmental organization established by the signing of the Charter of the United Nations, UN Charter on 26 June 1945 with the stated purpose of maintaining international peace and internationa ...

operation off the coast of

Libya Libya, officially the State of Libya, is a country in the Maghreb region of North Africa. It borders the Mediterranean Sea to the north, Egypt to Egypt–Libya border, the east, Sudan to Libya–Sudan border, the southeast, Chad to Chad–L ...

. The vessel was redeployed to the area in 2016, and on 17 November 2016 rescued 50 migrants who were on a rubber boat 25 Nautical Miles North-west of Tripoli. This brought the number of migrants rescued by the ''Samuel Beckett'' to 2310. In March 2020 the Naval Service provided the vessel to the HSE as a testing centre to be docked at Sir John Rogerson's Quay as part of Irish response to the coronavirus pandemic.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Samuel Beckett (P61) 2013 ships Ships built in Devon Samuel Beckett-class offshore patrol vessels Naval ships of the Republic of Ireland