Brusselle Carral from Belgium selected to provide deck equipment for new minehunters of Belgian and Dutch navies.

According to a press release published by the French company Naval Group on July 31, 2020, Brusselle Carral, a Belgian company based in Zeebruges, has been selected on July 28th, 2020 as a supplier of deck equipment for the new minehunters built by Kership for Belgium Naval & Robotics (Naval Group / ECA Group consortium) for the Belgian and Dutch Navies.
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Belgian Company Brusselle Carral will provide deck equipment for new minehunters of Belgian and Dutch navies. (Picture source Brusselle Carral)

Brusselle Carral is based in Zeebruges, Flanders and its activities focus on engineering and producing winches and steering gears. They have been selected in the frame of the naval mine countermeasures capability replacement, a program led by Belgium Naval & Robotics – Naval Group and ECA Group consortium – which provides for the supply of twelve mine hunters equipped with drone systems (Toolbox) to the Belgian and Royal Netherlands navies. They will be responsible of the design, construction and delivery of the electric driven constant tensioning anchor and mooring winches, for the 12 minehunters.

Noel Deputter said at this occasion: “This is a strategic reference for us to be part of this major program for the Belgian and Dutch navies. Our cooperation with BNR will bring out the best of our technical expertise. We are very much looking forward to this new partnership.”

Michel Le Bouedec declared: “I am fully confident that this partnership will be fruitful for the minehunters program. We will soon be starting working with Brusselle Carral. We are much satisfied that the program moves forward, moreover associating a Belgian partner to the project.”

Indeed this partnership with a Belgian company is important as part of Belgium Naval and Robotics’ industrial cooperation plan, which aims at setting up a long-term presence in Belgium in key strategic domains through a series of measures satisfying Belgium’s Essential Security Interests. As part of those measures, a significant part of the MCM program is to be carried out in Belgium.

The contract for twelve minehunters for the Belgian and Dutch navies has been notified in 2019 and will span over ten years. After a design period of three years, Belgium Naval & Robotics (Naval Group / ECA Group consortium) will lead the production phase, which will be executed by Kership.

Six ships will be delivered to the Belgian navy and six to the Dutch navy with a first delivery scheduled for 2024. They will be equipped with a complete drones system containing a total of more than a hundred underwater, surface, and aerial drones entirely dedicated to mine hunting.

Last June, BNR has successfully passed the « systems functional review ». The supplier of deck equipment has now been selected.