The Ægir class Offshore Patrol vessel

Patrol boat

A patrol boat is a relatively small naval vessel generally designed for coastal defense duties.There have been many designs for patrol boats. They may be operated by a nation's navy, coast guard, or police force, and may be intended for marine and/or estuarine or river environments...

 is a class of two vessels serving in the Icelandic Coast Guard

Icelandic Coast Guard

The Icelandic Coast Guard is the service responsible for Iceland's coastal defense and maritime and aeronautical search and rescue. Origins of the Icelandic Coast Guard can be traced to 1859, when the corvette Ørnen started patrolling Icelandic waters...

(ICG). They participated in the two latter Cod War

Cod War

The Cod Wars, also called the Icelandic Cod Wars , were a series of confrontations in the 1950s and 1970s between the United Kingdom and Iceland regarding fishing rights in the North Atlantic....

s.

The vessels conduct EEZ patrol, Search and Rescue

Search and rescue

Search and rescue is the search for and provision of aid to people who are in distress or imminent danger.The general field of search and rescue includes many specialty sub-fields, mostly based upon terrain considerations...

, Fishery inspections, general Law Enforcement and Counter-terrorism

Counter-terrorism

Counter-terrorism is the practices, tactics, techniques, and strategies that governments, militaries, police departments and corporations adopt to prevent or in response to terrorist threats and/or acts, both real and imputed.The tactic of terrorism is available to insurgents and governments...

 operations in Icelandic waters and the waters of the surrounding territories, such as Greenland

Greenland

Greenland is an autonomous country within the Kingdom of Denmark, located between the Arctic and Atlantic Oceans, east of the Canadian Arctic Archipelago. Though physiographically a part of the continent of North America, Greenland has been politically and culturally associated with Europe for...

 and Jan Mayen

Jan Mayen

Jan Mayen Island is a volcanic island in the Arctic Ocean and part of the Kingdom of Norway. It is long and 373 km2 in area, partly covered by glaciers . It has two parts: larger northeast Nord-Jan and smaller Sør-Jan, linked by an isthmus wide...

.

Vessels

Ægir class

#	Name	Laid down	Launched	Commissioned	Notes
	Ægir		June, 1968	1968
	Týr		March, 1975	1975

The design

The concept for the Ægir class OPV was based on the Coast Guard experiences with the ICGV Þór and ICGV Óðinn. R.Adm Pétur Sigurðsson, commander of the ICG, set forth a requirement for a ship larger than both the Þór and Óðinn and more seaworthy. The vessels were also armored for ice breaking.

Armament

When originally commissioned the ships of the Ægir-class main armament was the 57 mm Hotchkiss

QF 6 pounder Hotchkiss

The QF 6 pounder Hotchkiss was a light 57 mm naval gun and coast defence gun of the late 19th century used by many countries, and was adapted for use in the early British tanks in World War I.- Canada History :...

 cannon. These weapons were however replaced in 1990 with the 40 mm Bofors L60 auto-cannon, which in turn was replaced with the 40 mm Bofors L70 in the late 2000s.

Among other weapons are small arms

Small arms

Small arms is a term of art used by armed forces to denote infantry weapons an individual soldier may carry. The description is usually limited to revolvers, pistols, submachine guns, carbines, assault rifles, battle rifles, multiple barrel firearms, sniper rifles, squad automatic weapons, light...

 and other suitable weapons, including Net cutters, which the Icelandic Coast Guard made famous during the Cod Wars.

External links

• http://www.lhg.is (in Icelandic
  Icelandic language
  Icelandic is a North Germanic language, the main language of Iceland. Its closest relative is Faroese.Icelandic is an Indo-European language belonging to the North Germanic or Nordic branch of the Germanic languages. Historically, it was the westernmost of the Indo-European languages prior to the...
  
  )