Port Belgrano Naval Base

Port Belgrano Naval Base (Template:Langx - BNPB) is the largest naval base of the Argentine Navy, situated next to Punta Alta, near Bahía Blanca, about Template:Convert south of Buenos Aires. It is named after the brigantine General Belgrano (named after Manuel Belgrano) which sounded the area in late 1824.

File:SLR2931.jpg

Krupp 240mm gun, Battery nº 4, Puerto Belgrano

Home of the Argentine Seas Fleet (Template:In lang Flota de Mar), it concentrates the major ships and arsenals; and is close to the main bases of other Argentine Navy organisations: Marine's camp Baterías and Naval aviation's air base Comandante Espora (Template:Langx - BACE) .

History

Designed by Italian engineer Luis Luiggi, Puerto Belgrano opened on November 30, 1896, under the name Puerto Militar (Template:Langx). In 1911, the French-owned railway company Ferrocarril Rosario y Puerto Belgrano opened a broad gauge (Template:Convert) line between Puerto Belgrano and Rosario. The harbor was renamed Puerto Belgrano in 1923.

File:D11ARALaArgentina.jpg

ARA La Argentina, docked at Puerto Belgrano.

The base grew in importance with the size of the fleet. During World War I and World War II the Template:Sclasss and were docked here, and during the Cold War the aircraft carriers and were docked at this base.

The shipyard continues doing maintenance and refits of vessels and submarines.

In April 2006, the Royal Navy's Antarctic patrol vessel Template:HMS entered Puerto Belgrano for repairs after damaging its rudder while in Antarctica in February. It was the first time since the end of the 1982 Falklands War (Template:Langx) that a British Royal Navy ship had entered the Argentine naval base.

Facilities

The base contains a naval hospital, specialized workshops, six middle and tertiary level military schools, a banking headquarters and seven residential neighborhoods for naval personnel, public schools, a printing press, the newsroom of the magazine "Gaceta Marinera", a bank headquarters, the "Stella Maris" Catholic parish, a civil registry, post office, a museum, seven residential neighborhoods for naval personnel, a hotel, among other facilities. All of them surround the quays and drywalls that were proposed by the ship's captain Félix Dufourq, who carried out many of the studies aimed at finding the most suitable place for the construction of the naval facilities.

Based ships

Source:

Destroyers

File:Destructores ARA “Sarandí” y ARA “Almirante Brown” (34635698546).jpg

ARA Sarandí and ARA Almirante Brown in 2017.

• ARA Almirante Brown (D-10)
• ARA La Argentina (D-11)
• ARA Sarandí (D-13)

Corvettes

File:P41Esporax15.jpg

ARA Espora, the lead ship of the Espora Class Corvettes.

• ARA Espora (P-41)
• ARA Rosales (P-42)
• ARA Spiro (P-43)
• ARA Parker (P-44)
• ARA Robinson (P-45)
• ARA Gómez Roca (P-46)

Auxiliaries and Amphibious

• ARA Patagonia (B-1)
• ARA Canal Beagle (B-3)
• ARA Bahía San Blas (B-4)
• ARA Puerto Argentino (A-21)
• ARA Estrecho de San Carlos (A-22)
• ARA Islas Malvinas (A-24)
• ARA Teniente Olivieri (A-2)
• ARA Punta Alta (Q-63)

Antarctic Naval Command

• ARA Almirante Irízar

Tugships

• ARA Querandí (R-2)
• ARA Tehuelche (R-3)
• ARA Mataco (R-4)
• ARA Mocoví (R-5)
• ARA Zeus (R-9)

Centro Espacial Manuel Belgrano (CEMB)

A launch pad is planned Argentine space launch vehicle "Tronador II", named Centro Espacial Manuel Belgrano (CEMB) at Template:Coord. Land for the construction of the facilities were ceded to CONAE (Argentine Space Agency). The location was selected because of existing Navy facilities, security measures already in place, large enough available area, and a favorable location for launches into polar orbits.

See also

• List of shipyards of Argentina
• Mar del Plata Naval Base
• Ushuaia Naval Base
• Falklands Naval Station

References

Sources

• Template:In lang Puerto Belgrano history at Histarmar
• HMS Endurance completes repairs in Puerto Belgrano

External links

• Template:In lang Official Site