4th Naval Warfare Flotilla

The 4th Naval Warfare Flotilla is a unit whose task is to train vessel crews, staff personnel and operators of repair and command vessels, corvettes, minesweepers and EOD groups. Operations are designed to ensure the capability to engage in armed combat at sea is maintained and further developed through training and exercising career officers and national service personnel. This is done via both national and international naval exercises including within the parameters of Partnership for Peace (PFF).

Minesweepers and ordnance clearing divers offer a capability that is in short supply at national and international level. This is the capability to search, trace, pinpoint, identify, disarm and salvage ordnance under water. EOD diver groups also have the capability to further enhance these capabilities and operate on both land and sea, in the latter case both on the surface and in the water.

The corvettes have excellent armed combat capabilities at sea, above and below the surface. Their excellent capability to operate close to shore and in archipelagos is becoming increasingly in demand internationally. Corvettes can patrol large sea areas and monitor air space and have tremendous strike power where necessary. Fleet and command vessels have the capability to support flotilla vessels and provide the platform for unit commanders heading unit operations at sea.

The Landsort class, constructed of Glassfibre Reinforced Plastic (GRP), was built at Kockums' Karlskrona shipyard in the early 1980s, and will continue play an important role in the Swedish Navy's future organisation. In May 2005 the comprehensive Landsort project was launched at Kockums in Karlskrona. Five of the Swedish Navy's mine countermeasures vessels (MCMVs) are to undergo mid-life upgrades, as well as modification for international missions. The total order is worth more than one billion Swedish kronor. Kockums is principal contractor and will be responsible, among other things, for procurement of command and sonar systems. Intensive efforts were being made on the construction side, while the work of removing obsolete equipment has already started on the first, HMS Koster. HMS Vinga and HMS Ulvön would soon follow their sister vessel into the shipyard.

Initially, these three vessels will be modified to enable participation in the Swedish international rapid reaction force, after which they will undergo a general refit. Later, all five vessels will be equipped with new weapon and command systems, new air-defence systems and a remote-operated underwater vehicle (ROV) which will possess a mine-hunting capability, among other features.

The first two Koster-class mine countermeasures vessels modernised by Kockums for the Royal Swedish Navy (RSwN) were recommissioned into service on 13 March 2009. Mid-life upgrades (MLUs) for HMS Koster and HMS Vinga were completed at Kockums' Karlskrona shipyard in January and August 2008 respectively, when the ships were handed over to the Swedish Defence Materiel Administration (Försvarets Materielverk [FMV]) for acceptance trials.