Linge-class tugboat

The Linge class are a series of tugboats used by the Royal Netherlands Navy to dock their larger ships at the Nieuwe Haven Naval Base.

History
The first four ships were built by Shipyard Bijlsma and Delta shipyard in the Netherlands and commissioned in the year 1987. Ten years later another ship, Gouwe, was built by these shipyards and commissioned in 1997. As an avocation to their main purpose they are used for trips with guests around the harbour.

Replacement
It was decided that these ships were not capable enough anymore to handle the newer larger vessels like HNLMS Karel Doorman (A833). The four oldest ships would be replaced by three Damen built hybrid tugboats, the Noordzee-class tugboat.

Although with the arrival of the first replacement, HNLMS Noordzee (A871), the old tugboats did not prove completely useless when the power onboard Noordzee shut off due to contaminated fuel along the coast of North-Holland and Hunze had to assist.

The first four ships were sold to MTS Towage in Brixham and Falmouth in the United Kingdom.

Namesakes
All the ships are named after rivers with five letters ending with an e in The Netherlands:
 * HNLMS Linge's namesake is: Linge
 * HNLMS Regge's namesake is: Regge
 * HNLMS Hunze's namesake is: Hunze
 * HNLMS Rotte's namesake is: Rotte
 * HNLMS Gouwe's namesake is: Gouwe