A Dream Day For A Ship Spotter

7 Jul 2012 3 Comments

Although Istanbul is on a very busy maritime city, we seldom witness so many naval action in one day and see so many different warships from different countries at the same time.

There were three frigates of NATO’s SNMG-2, five coast guard vessels from five Black Sea nations, one Japanese coast guard training ship plus various Turkish naval and coast guard vessels. It was a wonderful day to enjoy the breeze at the Bosphorus and to be a ship spotter.

SNMG-2 Ships:

F-217 FGS Bayern and F-712 FS Courbet

F-495 TCG Gediz

The coast guard vessels were in Istanbul to participate the one day naval exercise Black Sea Hawk 2012. This exercise is conducted for the first time this year and it aims to improve cooperation and interoperability between among the Black Sea Littoral States Border/Coast Guard Authorities.

Turkish built, Georgian Coast Guard Vessel P-24 Sokhumi. She is dwarfed by the cruise ship Celebrity Equinox

Bulgarian coast guard vessel 525 Sozopol.

Ukrainian coast guard vessel BG-57 Mikoliav

Russian coast guard vessel 050 Rubin.

Romanian coast guard vessel MAI-1105 Stefan Cel Mare, behind Japanese coast guard ship PL-21 JCG Kojima and inside of Bulgarian vessel 525 Sozopol.

Turkish coast guard vessel TCSG-303

Turkish coast guard vessel TCSG-106

Turkish coast guard vessel TCSG-312

Turkish coast guard vessel TCSG-90

Turkish coast guard vessel TCSG-93

The Japanese coast guard authorized in 1990 the building of a new training ship. That ship is now in Istanbul PL-21 JCG Kojima is the training ship of the Japanese Coast Guard is in on her annual global training cruise.

PL-21 JCG Kojima

The naval activity during the day was not limited to the visits of SNMG-2 and JCG Kojima and the Black Sea Hawk 2012 exercise. Here are some photos from the ordinary daily naval activity in Bosphorus: