The Type 333 Kulmbach class is a class of five German Navy

German Navy

The German Navy is the navy of Germany and is part of the unified Bundeswehr .The German Navy traces its roots back to the Imperial Fleet of the revolutionary era of 1848 – 52 and more directly to the Prussian Navy, which later evolved into the Northern German Federal Navy...

 ships. Built as Type 343 Hameln class minesweepers, they have been upgraded to minehunter

Minehunter

Minehunters are mine countermeasure vessels that actively detect and destroy individual naval mines. Minesweepers, on the other hand, clear mined areas as a whole, without prior detection of mines...

s using Seefuchs expendable drones to detonate detected naval mine

Naval mine

A naval mine is a self-contained explosive device placed in water to destroy surface ships or submarines. Unlike depth charges, mines are deposited and left to wait until they are triggered by the approach of, or contact with, an enemy vessel...

s.

List of ships

Pennant number Pennant number In the modern Royal Navy, and other navies of Europe and the Commonwealth, ships are identified by pennant numbers...	Name	Call sign Call sign In broadcasting and radio communications, a call sign is a unique designation for a transmitting station. In North America they are used as names for broadcasting stations...	commissioned
M1091	Kulmbach Kulmbach Kulmbach is the capital of the district of Kulmbach in Bavaria in Germany. The town is famous for Plassenburg Castle, which houses the largest tin soldier museum in the world, and for its famous sausages, or Bratwürste.-Location:...	DRFU	May 23, 1990
M1095	Überherrn Überherrn Überherrn is a municipality in the district of Saarlouis, in Saarland, Germany. It is situated along the river Bist on the border with France, approx. southwest of Saarlouis, and west of Saarbrücken. It has 12,150 inhabitants. At the part Felsberg-Berus, there is the Longwave transmitter Europe...	DRFS	September 19, 1989
M1096	Passau Passau Passau is a town in Lower Bavaria, Germany. It is also known as the Dreiflüssestadt or "City of Three Rivers," because the Danube is joined at Passau by the Inn from the south and the Ilz from the north....	DRFK	December 18, 1990
M1097	Laboe Laboe Laboe is a municipality in the district of Plön, in Schleswig-Holstein, Germany. It is situated on the Baltic Sea coast, approximately 10 km northeast of Kiel. The Laboe Naval Memorial is located within the municipality, as is the submarine U-995....	DRFJ	December 7, 1989
M1099	Herten Herten Herten is a town and a municipality in the district of Recklinghausen, in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. It is situated in the industrial Ruhr Area, approx...	DRFP	March 26, 1991

Notes: The listed commission dates are from their original commission as Type 343 boats since they were not formally recommissoned after their upgrade to Type 333 mine hunters.

The ships currently belong to the 3. Minensuchgeschwader (3. mine sweeper squadron) based in Kiel

Kiel

Kiel is the capital and most populous city in the northern German state of Schleswig-Holstein, with a population of 238,049 .Kiel is approximately north of Hamburg. Due to its geographic location in the north of Germany, the southeast of the Jutland peninsula, and the southwestern shore of the...

 at the Baltic Sea

Baltic Sea

The Baltic Sea is a brackish mediterranean sea located in Northern Europe, from 53°N to 66°N latitude and from 20°E to 26°E longitude. It is bounded by the Scandinavian Peninsula, the mainland of Europe, and the Danish islands. It drains into the Kattegat by way of the Øresund, the Great Belt and...

.

External links

• Marine-Portraits