HMAS Gladstone (FCPB 216)
Australia · Oceania
About
HMAS Gladstone (FCPB 216), named for the city of Gladstone, Queensland, is a Fremantle class patrol boat, formerly operated by Royal Australian Navy (RAN). Built by NQEA during the early 1980s, Gladstone was commissioned into RAN service in 1984. The patrol boat spent most of its career operating out of the naval base HMAS Cairns on fisheries and border protection operations. The ship's company were granted Freedom of the City of their ship's namesake city on three occasions. Gladstone was decommissioned in 2007, and was donated to the Gladstone Maritime History Society for preservation and display as a museum ship at the Gladstone Maritime Museum. Work was postponed due to the 2008 financial crisis, with preservation work and development of a wet dock to display the ship completed in 2016. The vessel is now available for tours on weekends and is located in the Gladstone East Shores precinct, adjacent to the Gladstone Marina.
Adapted from Wikipedia (CC BY-SA). Photography via Wikimedia Commons.