By South China Morning Post | Created at 2024-11-21 11:41:34 | Updated at 2024-11-21 15:44:53
4 hours ago
Two warships from the People’s Liberation Army Navy fleet, including its largest amphibious assault vessel, arrived in Hong Kong on Thursday for a five-day visit.
Two government fireboats gave the vessels – the destroyer Changsha and assault ship Hainan – a water salute in the morning as they entered Victoria Harbour through the East Lamma Strait.
Hainan’s visit marks the first Hong Kong port call by such a vessel. Commissioned on April 23, 2021, Hainan is the lead ship of the Type 075 landing helicopter dock class, known to be the largest amphibious warship of the PLA Navy and which can carry up to 30 aircraft.
It can be used as a mother ship for amphibious warfare and can transport soldiers and vehicles for landing operations.
Changsha is one of the PLA Navy’s Type 052D guided missile destroyers.
It was commissioned on August 12, 2015, and it is armed with a vertical launching system (VLS) that can fire a variety of air defence, land attack, anti-ship and anti-submarine missiles with the help of active electronically scanned array (AESA) radar.
