HMAS Advance was an Attack-class patrol boat of the Royal Australian Navy (RAN). Constructed during 1967 and commissioned into the RAN in 1968, Advance operated from Darwin and patrolled northern Australian waters.
HMAS Ardent was an Attack-class patrol boat of the Royal Australian Navy (RAN). She was built by Evans Deakin and Company, and was commissioned into the RAN in 1968. Ardent was decommissioned in 1994, then assigned as a navigation training vessel. At the end of 1998, she was removed from service. Initially marked for preservation at the Darwin Military Museum, the vessel was sold into civilian service in 2001 after the Northern Territory government declined. In 2002, the patrol boat was acquired by the Indonesian Navy, and commissioned as KRI Tenggiri (865) in 2003.
HMAS Arrow was an Attack-class patrol boat of the Royal Australian Navy (RAN).
HMAS Flinders, named for Matthew Flinders (1774–1814), was a hydrographic survey ship of the Royal Australian Navy (RAN). Built by HMA Naval Dockyard at Williamstown, Victoria, Flinders was commissioned into the RAN in 1973, and was used to conduct hydrographic surveys in the waters to Australia's north, including parts of New Guinea. In 1974, the ship was tasked with assisting clean up efforts in the wake of Cyclone Tracy, which devastated large parts of Darwin. The ship was decommissioned in 1998 and sold to civilian operators, who have since converted her into a private yacht in the Cayman Islands.
The Fremantle-class patrol boats were coastal patrol vessels operated by the Royal Australian Navy (RAN) from 1979 to 2007. Designed by British shipbuilder Brooke Marine and constructed in Australia by NQEA, the Fremantle class were larger, more powerful, and more capable than the preceding Attack class, and the two primary patrol boat bases required infrastructure upgrades to support them. Although up to 30 vessels were planned, fifteen were ordered and constructed, with an unexercised option for five more.
Z Special Unit was a joint Allied special forces unit formed during the Second World War to operate behind Japanese lines in South East Asia. Predominantly Australian, Z Special Unit was a specialist reconnaissance and sabotage unit that included British, Dutch, New Zealand, Timorese and Indonesian members, predominantly operating on Borneo and the islands of the former Dutch East Indies.
HMAS Coonawarra is a Royal Australian Navy (RAN) base located in Darwin, Northern Territory, and is home to nine fleet units of the RAN. The current commander is Captain Moses Raudino, ADC, RAN.
The Fleet Base East is a Royal Australian Navy (RAN) major fleet base that comprises several naval establishments and facilities clustered around Sydney Harbour, centred on HMAS Kuttabul. The Fleet Base East extends beyond the borders of Kuttabul and includes the commercially-operated dockyard at Garden Island, and adjacent wharf facilities at nearby Woolloomooloo, east of the Sydney central business district in New South Wales, Australia. Fleet Base East is one of two major facilities of the RAN, the other facility being the Fleet Base West. The fleet operates in the Pacific Ocean.
HMAS Waterhen is a Royal Australian Navy (RAN) base located in Waverton on Sydney's lower north shore, within Sydney Harbour, in New South Wales, Australia. Constructed on the site of a quarry used to expand Garden Island in the 1930s, the location was used during World War II as a boom net maintenance and storage area. In 1962, the area was commissioned as a base of the RAN, and became home to the RAN's mine warfare forces. Waterhen was the first small-ship base established by the RAN, and from 1969 to 1979 was also responsible for the RAN's patrol boat forces.
HMAS Sirius was a commercial tanker purchased by the Royal Australian Navy and converted into a fleet replenishment vessel to replace HMAS Westralia. She was named in honour of HMS Sirius of the First Fleet. Launched in South Korea on 2004, and converted in Western Australia, Sirius was commissioned in 2006; three years before a purpose-built vessel would have been built, and at half the cost. The tanker was decommissioned in 2021.
The MV Krait is a wooden-hulled vessel famous for its use during World War II by the Z Special Unit of Australia during the raid against Japanese ships anchored in Singapore Harbour. The raid was known as Operation Jaywick.
HMAS Armidale (J240), named for the then town of Armidale, New South Wales, was one of 60 Bathurst-class corvettes constructed during World War II, and one of 36 initially manned and commissioned solely by the Royal Australian Navy (RAN).
HMAS Townsville, named for the city of Townsville, Queensland, was a Fremantle-class patrol boat of the Royal Australian Navy (RAN). Built by NQEA, Cairns, the ship was laid down in 1979, and commissioned into the RAN in 1981.
The harbour defence motor launch (HDML) was a 72 ft (22 m) long British-designed motor vessel used for harbour defence during World War II. Nearly 500 were built by numerous Allied countries during the war.
Coastal Forces was a division of the Royal Navy established during World War II. It consisted of small coastal defence craft such as Motor Launches, submarine chasers, air-sea rescue launches, Motor Gun Boats and Motor Torpedo Boats. It did not include minesweepers, trawlers or landing craft. This article is about the equivalent boats used by the Royal Australian Navy (RAN).
Two units of the Royal Australian Navy (RAN) have been named HMAS Rushcutter, for Rushcutters Bay, New South Wales.
HMAS Bass was an Explorer class general-purpose vessel of the Royal Australian Navy (RAN), serving in a range of capacities from 1960 until 1994.
HMAS HDML 1324, also known as Nepean was a 58-ton Harbour Defence Motor Launch of the Royal Australian Navy (RAN). Built by A.McFarlane and Sons, Birkenhead, South Australia and commissioned into the RAN on 12 June 1944. She was at the Timor surrender of the Japanese occupying forces in 1945. She was later reclassified as a Seaward Defence Boat. Parts from HDML 1324 were used to refit SDB 1325.
Operation Copper was carried out by the Allied commando unit Z Special Unit, during World War II. The objective of the mission was to investigate the Japanese defences on Muschu Island, capture a Japanese officer for interrogation and discover the location of two naval guns on the island that covered the approaches to Wewak Harbour. Eight commandos were landed as part of the operation; only one survived.
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