In 1999, the construction of the Hyundai-class destroyer purchased by our country was completed, but how to drive it back has become a difficult problem.
The first modern-class ** Hangzhou ship ordered by China from Russia was completed in 1999 at the Russian Northern Shipyard.
Due to the complicated situation of the route back to China, several responsible persons chose to buy Russian underwater rifles after some discussion.
Why should our country buy underwater rifles? Did the Hangzhou ship suffer an accident on the way back to China?
On December 17, 2021, smoke billowed from a ship** at the Russian Northern Shipyard, and although the fire was fierce, fortunately only 5 staff members were slightly injured.
The international community is no longer surprised by this fire, because before this, there have been many fires in the Northern Shipyard, one of which occurred on the fourth modern-class ** Ningbo ship ordered by China.
On April 7, 2005, the Ningbo ship docked at the dock of the North Shipyard suddenly emitted bursts of black smoke from the inside of the hull.
After learning the news, the local fire department attached great importance to it and sent more than 40 fire trucks and hundreds of firefighters to the Northern Shipyard to extinguish the fire.
But the firefighters were dumbfounded when they arrived, because the first point this time was inside the hull, and some large fire-fighting equipment could not enter at all, and if they did not bring these fire-fighting equipment, it would be difficult to extinguish the fire.
Seeing that the fire is getting bigger and bigger, if the fire is not extinguished, the Ningbo ship, which was built with great difficulty, will be scrapped immediately.
No matter how huge the amount of money will be spent to build another Ningbo ship, the liquidated damages paid to China will be astronomical just because the construction period cannot be caught up.
At this time, the person in charge of the Northern Shipyard, like an ant on a hot pot, was in a hurry, but he had no choice but to watch the fire swallow up the Ningbo ship.
Although the overall frame of the Ningbo ship is made of special steel, it is not afraid of fire in a short period of time, but after a long time, the special steel will also soften and eventually break, and eventually the entire Ningbo ship can only become a pile of scrap iron.
After a short discussion with the fire department, they decided to cut a hole in the shell of the Ningbo ship that could accommodate firefighting equipment, and the firefighters carried the firefighting equipment in to extinguish the fire.
The idea is very plump, the reality is very skinny, the Ningbo ship is a **, the hull is made of special steel, and the general bullets cannot penetrate it, and it is very difficult to cut.
The cutters brought by the firefighters are all for cutting civilian steel, and they can't cut special steel at all, and they have a headache when they think of this firefighter.
The head of the Northern Shipyard, after learning about the difficulties of the firefighters, immediately said that there were cutters in the shipyard that were capable of cutting special steel.
In the end, the shipyard sent more than 100 workers to assist the firefighters and cut a hole in the Ningbo ship that could accommodate firefighters and firefighting equipment to enter and exit.
Soon, with the tacit cooperation of workers and firefighters, the fire gradually became smaller, and after two hours of intense rescue, firefighters rescued four shipyard workers who were trapped in the interior of the ship's cabin due to the fire.
Unfortunately, there was still a painter inside the cabin, who was unable to escape in time and died in the fire.
Just when everyone was relieved that the fire had been extinguished, a loud bang came, and it turned out to be a cabin under their feet.
Unfortunately, a fire commander was here to check if anyone was trapped, and after that, the commander died on the spot.
After the fire, the relevant departments immediately launched an investigation into the Ningbo ship** incident, and the results of the investigation showed that the fire was ruled out as a deliberate arson, which was caused by the sparks generated by the short circuit of the wires inside the hull, which ignited the surrounding building materials.
Later, the person in charge of the shipyard said in an interview with **: We will adopt a policy of 3 shifts, work day and night, and will definitely build ** before the delivery date.
In the next few days, the Northern Shipyard declined the ** interview, but some people still saw that the radar on the Ningbo ship was still running, and people speculated that the shipyard was using the radar to assess the extent of damage to the Ningbo ship.
Fortunately, the entire hull of the Ningbo ship is a special steel structure, so the fire did not cause the Ningbo ship to suffer a devastating blow.
Contrary to the Ningbo ship, the construction of the Hangzhou ship was exceptionally smooth before, but after the delivery, there was a problem in front of the Chinese Navy, that is, how to safely drive the Hangzhou ship back to China?
The return route of the Hangzhou ship to China is complicated, and the Chinese Navy is meticulous and does a good job of transferring along the way.
What's so complicated about this route? How did the Chinese Navy do a good job of transitioning?
After the collapse of the Soviet Union, the Northern Shipyard had a very difficult time, and even once there was news that it was going to go out of business, and at this time, the Northern Shipyard received an order from four modern class ** in our country.
This order directly brought the northern shipyard back to life, so the entire shipyard, from the person in charge to the workers, attached great importance to this order and began to work overtime to build.
Finally, in 1999, the "Hangzhou ship" was successfully completed, and everyone in the northern shipyard breathed a sigh of relief after the completion of the Hangzhou ship, but on the contrary, the Chinese navy became nervous.
Because this is the first time that the Chinese Navy has received the Hyundai-class ** from abroad, many of the steps of receiving the ship are still very rusty to deal with.
The Northern Shipyard said that as long as the Hangzhou ship is successfully delivered, then they will no longer be responsible for the Hangzhou ship. Prior to this, the Russian side specially trained some officers and men to receive the ship.
This is because long before the Hangzhou was built, the Chinese Navy decided to sail the Hangzhou back to China on its own.
After the Chinese Navy received the Hangzhou ship, several responsible persons of the Hangzhou ship discussed with the Chinese Navy and chose a route that was safer and had more complex navigation waters, which could allow the officers and men of the Navy to become familiar with the Hangzhou ship more quickly.
The route starts in St. Petersburg and passes through the English Channel before stopping at the French port of Brest, where the officers and men of the Hangzhou will make a two-day replenishment and visit.
After leaving France, the Hangzhou will sail south into the Mediterranean Sea and eventually reach the Middle East, where it will dock at Port Said, Egypt, where it will be replenished for two days of food and fuel.
After confirming that everything is okay, the Hangzhou will leave Egypt, enter the Red Sea through the Suez Canal, then enter the Indian Ocean, head straight east, and finally join the Chinese Navy in the Strait of Malacca, a journey of one and a half months.
The General Staff Department has set up a special transfer group responsible for the transfer of the Hangzhou warship in various countries, and the work of this group is to negotiate and coordinate with the countries through which the Hangzhou warship passes.
In addition, in order to ensure that the transfer of the Hangzhou ship is foolproof, the General Staff Department has also set up a contract support group, which is specially designed to communicate with the relevant Russian departments and ask the Russian side to help the Hangzhou ship carry out the transfer.
In order to better pilot the Hangzhou ship, the contract support team also negotiated with Russia and invited 18 Russian naval soldiers and 20 shipyard experts to return to China with the Hangzhou ship.
Sailing the Hangzhou from Russia back to China may sound simple, but because the route of the Hangzhou ship passes through dozens of countries.
As a large ship of other countries, if it sails into the waters of other countries without reporting, it will not only leave a domineering image in the international community, but also is likely to cause attacks by other countries.
In order to avoid this situation, my country has already greeted these countries in advance. In addition, the transfer team also has to coordinate and negotiate with the countries where the Hangzhou ship is docked one by one to ensure the food, fuel, and details of the visit of the Hangzhou ship.
After these problems are resolved, the Hangzhou ship is bound to return to China smoothly if nothing else.
But on this route determined by the General Staff and ***, there are several places where piracy is very rampant, what if ** is attacked?
Many people are puzzled, how can a dignified modern-class ** be worried about pirate attacks?
In fact, this is because the Hangzhou ship has just been built, and it is not equipped with ** ammunition, and there are only a few shells on the entire Hangzhou ship, if these shells are used to hit some small targets such as pirates, the effect will not be very good.
Another reason is that at that time, the Chinese Navy's purchase of modern-class ** from Russia was widely spread internationally, and many international ** were unwilling to let go of the topic.
In case of a hostile force disguised as pirates and attacking the Hangzhou ship, it is obvious that these self-defense shells will not play a defensive role at all, in order to ensure that the Hangzhou ship is safe and sound on the way home, the General Staff decided to buy some ** in Russia.
One of them is very special, not only able to deal with potential enemies in the water, but also to fill the gap in this aspect of our country after returning home to dismantle it.
What exactly is this **?
In order to deal with the unexpected situation that the Hangzhou ship might encounter on the way home, the General Staff ordered the purchase of underwater rifles.
What is the significance of the General Staff buying an underwater rifle?
At that time, it was common for pirates to dive into the water with oxygen cylinders and then take the opportunity to plant bombs or sneak onto ships, and it was difficult to effectively kill and injure enemies in the water with ordinary rifles alone.
You should know that the resistance of water is 800 times that of air, and it is difficult to cause effective killing after the bullet fired by the general rifle passes one meter in the water, while the bullet of the underwater rifle is specially designed to be streamlined, which can reduce the resistance of the water.
Even if the enemy is in the water, as long as it does not dive too deep, underwater rifles can effectively kill and injure the enemy, and it is precisely because of this in mind that the General Staff ordered the purchase of underwater rifles.
After doing all the coordination work, the Hangzhou ship officially set sail for China, and according to the original plan, the Hangzhou ship left St. Petersburg and came to the French port of Brest.
After arriving at the port, the Chinese Navy began to replenish the territory of France, and when it came to replenishing heavy fuel oil, due to the inconsistency of Russian fuel replenishment equipment and the specifications of the pipelines provided by France.
When filling the oil, there will be some heavy oil residues at the mouth of the pipe, so when the Chinese Navy pulled the French oil-filled pipe, these residual heavy oil gushed out instantly.
It didn't take long to dye the water near the Hangzhou ship black, you must know that France is a country that pays great attention to the environment, and like this kind of large-scale pollution, France ** will generally fine and seize.
At that time, the French colonel was in charge of receiving the Hangzhou ship, and after seeing this scene, the colonel did not blame the Chinese personnel, but instead ordered his subordinates to quickly fence around the oil bar.
Then use the oil suction machine to absorb all the oil sprayed in the sea, the whole process is completed in one go, under his methodical command, it only took two hours to clean up the sea surface.
In this process, they did not blame the Chinese side at all, but calmly said that they would hand it over to them, and after the handling was over, they still warmly entertained the entourage of the Hangzhou ship.
According to the original plan, after leaving France, the next stop of the Hangzhou ship came to Port Said, Egypt, where an interesting incident also happened.
The Russian Consulate in Egypt, after inquiring about the 38 Russian personnel on board the Hangzhou ship, sent a military attache with beer and French fries to the Hangzhou ship to comfort the 38 Russian personnel.
However, perhaps because of the hurry, the Russian consulate in Egypt did not have time to communicate with the Chinese side, but after careful consideration, the Chinese side still invited the Russian military attache to board the ship and have lunch with the 38 Russian personnel on board.
The Chinese chef on the ship in Hangzhou also made a Chinese specialty dish of braised pork for them.
This move by the Chinese side completely touched the hearts of the 38 Russian personnel on the Hangzhou ship, if it is said that they followed the Hangzhou ship to China only for work reasons.
However, after this incident, the experts of the Russian shipyard can be said to be responsive to China's needs and often take the initiative to work overtime, of course, the Chinese side did not treat them badly, and in terms of logistics support, the Chinese side did its best to ensure their needs.
In 2000, the Northern Shipyard delivered the second modern-class ** Fuzhou ship to the Chinese Navy, and with the experience of the first Hangzhou ship, the Fuzhou ship's return trip was much smoother.
In 2006, the Ningbo ship was also successfully delivered, so far China's navy has four modern class **, which has completely changed the situation that the mainland is inferior to Taiwan, China in large and medium-sized **.
In addition to this, what is even more precious is that these four modern class ** also brought technology, and these four modern class ** are the pinnacle of shipbuilding technology in the former Soviet Union.
After absorbing these technologies, China has successfully built more advanced domestically produced destroyers, and now the domestically produced destroyers, whether from radar, engines, or artillery and other components, can see the shadow of four modern-class destroyers.
Looking back on the past few decades, China has been constantly purchasing advanced foreign equipment, and carrying out independent innovation after digesting technology, so as to successfully stand among the world's powers in just a few decades.