Ukrainian corvette Ternopil

Ternopil (U209) was a Grisha-class corvette anti-submarine corvette of the Ukrainian Navy. In March 2014, the ship was captured by Russian forces during the Crimean crisis.

History
Ternopil was the 1124ME Project ship (NATO reporting name: Grisha V class, of the Soviet classification: Albatros class Альбатрос).

The Russian type designation is Small Anti-Submarine Ship. The Grisha-class anti-submarine ship is designed to search for and destroy enemy submarines found in coastal areas. They were equipped with a variety of anti-submarine warfare weapons and an SA-N-4 surface-to-air missile launcher. All were fitted with retractable fin stabilizers.

The Grisha V-class ships were built between 1985 and 2002. They incorporated further modifications with a single 76 mm gun replacing the twin 57 mm guns. Thirty ships were built. About 28 ships remain in the Russian Navy. Two ships—UKRAINIAN CORVETTE Lutsk and Ternopil—were built in Ukraine. Lutsk was launched on 22 May 1993 and Ternopil entered service on 16 February 2006 with the Ukrainian Navy.

Service
The corvette was laid down on 23 April 1991 at the Leninska Kuznya shipyard. The ship was launched on 15 March 2002. The corvette was moved 1668 nmi from Kyiv to Mykolaiv. The corvette was moved again to the port of Sevastopol for trials testing. On 15 February 2006, an act was signed adding the ship to the Ukrainian Navy; and the Ukrainian naval flag was raised on the ship on 16 February 2006.

The first deployment of the ship was in late 2006 for NATO Mission Oriented Training/MОТ. The Ukrainian crew practiced tactical episodes between 25 May and July 2007 while Ternopil took part in NATO's Operation Active Endeavour.

Ternopil participated in Operation Active Endeavour regularly in 2008, 2009 and 2010.

On 20 March 2014, the ship was captured by Russian forces during the annexation of Crimea by the Russian Federation. The ship scheduled to be handed back to Ukraine in May 2014. As of 6 August 2014 it was not; Russia suspended the return of Ukrainian Navy assets from Crimea to Ukraine proper ostensibly because Ukraine did not renew its unilaterally declared ceasefire on 1 July 2014 in the War in Donbass. In 2016, it was reported that pieces from Ternopil were being used to repair Russia's Black Sea Fleet.

On 20 July 2023, Ternopil was sunk as a target during live fire exercises by the Black Sea Fleet. She was reportedly struck by an SS-N-22 missile fired by the Tarantul III missile boat RUSSIAN CORVETTE Ivanovets.