MMI Zeffiro F577

Il_Signor_Regio · October 10, 2024, 7:23am

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Description: The Zeffiro F577 is an Italian anti-submarine frigate of the Cold War. In the seventies, after the experience with the Lupo class frigates, the Italian Navy decided to further improve the already-proven design in order to modify it for different tasks. Indeed, the newly named Maestrale class frigates were projected to carry far larger anty submarine warfare weapons and systems, but in exchange, the new ships had half the number of anty ship missiles of the Lupo class. The first ship of the class, the Mestrale F570, was launched in 1978 and completed in 1982, with the other units being delivered in the following years. The subject of this suggestion is the last unit, the Zeffiro F577, which was started in 1983 and delivered in 1985. Like all her sisters, she didn’t take part in any conflict during her lifetime, and she was one of the few (alongside Grecale and Libeccio) to receive some upgrades from 2007 to 2010. But even if it was the last ship of the class and one of the trio to receive some kind of upgrade, she was retired in 2023 while her sisterships remain active for now (even though they will probably be replaced soon by the two FREEM’s Spartaco Shergart and Emilio Bianchi). As already mentioned, the Maestrale class featured many differences compared to the Lupo class, such as a longer hull in order to fit additional sonars, one more hangar (increasing the number of AB212 ASW helicopters from 1 to 2), and two additional 533 mm torpedo launchers fitted in the back, increasing significantly its asw capabilities. For the armaments in general, the ship was equipped with the usual 127/54 mm OTO main cannon, capable of firing the Vulcano 127 mm guided round up to 100 km of range, 4x OTOMAT MK2 (later upgraded to the MK2 Block IV) anty ship missiles, 1x quadruple aspide 2000 launcher (initially fitted with aspide MK1), 2x triple B515 torpedo launcher fitted with the A244 and MK46 mod 2 324 mm torpedoes, 2x B516 fitted with A184 mod0 and mod 3 533 mm torpedoes, and 2x Breda Dardo 40 mm ciws.