Alkmaar-class minehunter

The Alkmaar class is a ship class of fifteen minehunters that were built in the Netherlands for the Royal Netherlands Navy. They are based on the design of the Tripartite-class minehunter, which was developed by a collaborative effort between the Netherlands, Belgium and France, and replaced the minesweepers and minehunters of the Dokkum-class minesweeper.

Design and construction
In 1975 the Netherlands, Belgium and France signed an agreement to develop a new mine countermeasures vessel together. At the same time it was also decided that each country would contribute to the construction by being responsible for certain components and systems. As a result, the Netherlands was responsible for the main propulsion, the gearboxes and propellers. France delivered the mine countermeasure and electronics systems, while Belgium build the remaining electronics and mechanic installations.

The construction of the Alkmaar class started in 1979 at the shipyard of Van der Giessen-De Noord in Alblasserdam. The ships were made from polyester, which required new construction methods in comparison to the previous mine countermeasure vessels that were built at the shipyard. As a result, Van der Giessen-De Noord invested 42 million Dutch guilders to build a new dedicated production hall that had a specific climate indoors and allowed serial construction in the same way as for aircraft production. Inside the production hall there was an assembly line that contained four stations, with each ship staying around 21 weeks at a station before moving to the next. Besides a new hall and tools, the shipyard also had to train personnel to be able to handle fiberglass and fiberglass sheets, which were used to construct the polyester ships. The construction of the 15 minehunters are estimated to have cost a total of 1.3 billion Dutch guilders.

Mine countermeasure systems
To hunt mines the Alkmaar class was equipped with the French DUBM 21B sonar, which was used to detect and classify mines, a Racal Decca 1229 radar and an EVEC plotting system. The sonar had a range of almost one kilometer and allowed the ship to search for mines up to a depth of 80 meters underwater. In addition, each ship was equipped with two Poisson Auto-Propulsé (PAP) type 104 submarine drones that were used for mine disposal. This PAP 104 wire guided drone had a television camera aboard for observation and could be fitted out with explosives to destroy mines from a safe distance.

Armament
The Alkmaar class had as armament a single 20 mm machine gun.

Service history
Between 1987 and 1989 Maassluis, Hellevoetsluis and Urk were active in the Persian Gulf as part of a Western European Union (WEU) mine clearing operation and placed under Belgian command.

In 1990 Alkmaar and Zierikzee took part in the exercise Safe Pass at the west coast of America.

Ships in class
The ships of the Alkmaar class are named after medium-sized Dutch municipalities that played a role in the Eighty Years' War and can also be accessed by these ships.

Ukraine
In March 2023 it was reported that the Netherlands would donate two Alkmaar-class minehunters to Ukraine. The transfer of these ships would most likely start from 2025.