Patrol OPV (PG) Constellation / Cassiopeia

The patrol boats [Pattugliatori] of the "Cassiopeia" or "Constellation" class (financed by the Ministry of merchant - today the Ministry of transport and navigation, and data management to Navy) have the ability to operate independently and cooperate with other aircraft or ships to ensure within the framework of the "exclusive economic zone":

• interventions relating to preservation in general national economic interests;
• the defense of marine platforms and Units engaged in prospecting/exploitation of the seabed;
• fisheries surveillance operations both in the form of contestation and documentation of violations of rights of national fishing vessels subject to contestation by foreign Authorities;
• the supervision and protection of the rules on protection of the marine environment; to search and rescue operations for the safety of life at sea;
• support first responders, medical technology, both in cases of fire, explosion or accident aboard or marine platforms.

They have anti-pollution equipment units have valid attack of polluted areas. For the rescue they embark a means "seppietta" to the rescue, firefighting equipment, consisting of a fully equipped infirmary. Helicopter capacity (hangar and flight deck) allows the use of aircraft with significant extension of the range of intervention. For all these units are also known as integrative and replacement in the role played by the corvette.

The ship Cassiopeia, the first in a class of offshore patrol vessels built in the Shipyards of Muggiano, La Spezia, was handed over to the Italian Navy in October 1989. Two were the ships that have had the same name: 1907 deep-sea Torpedo, Torpedo 1936. Cassiopeia in Greek mythology, was the Queen of Ethiopia and was transformed by Zeus into constellation. The constellation of Cassiopeia appears in autumn. In the northern hemisphere. It is located in the milky way near the North Pole, opposite to Ursa Major. The five-star list formed in the sky a irregular shaped M or W depending on the period in which we observe. When it is tilted sideways, like in a sense to a Chair, for which it is sometimes iderttificata as Chair of Cassiopeia. Its brightest star is ? Cassiopeiae, the Arabs, and Schedar has magnitude of 2.4 degrees. Two of the other stars of the constellation are variable stars because they change their brightness, color or intensity of the magnetic field due to intrinsic pulsations. The constellation also contains strong radio sources and many star clusters.

The Libra was built in the Shipyards of Muggiano hotels La Spezia and was delivered to the Navy in March 1991. One unit precedes the present with the same name: 1942/43 torpedo boat. Libra is the name attributed to the Group of stars in the constellation Libra: Alpha Librae, barely distinguishable to the naked eye, Beta Librae unusual green color, spectroscopic double (consisting of two stars, which are so close as to be identified only by means of the projection on a screen of their raysthrough a prism of Crystal), Delta Librae eclipsing double star (the brightness of its star varies periodically). The constellation of Libra is the seventh of the Zodiac and is clearly visible in the northern hemisphere; the Sun crosses Southeast from 23 September to 22 October, while in the South of the equator.