On the evening of 21 July the frigate INS Brahmaputra caught fire whilst undergoing a refit at the Mumbai Naval Dockyard. The fire was brought under control the following day with the ship resting on its portside. One of the ship’s company, Junior Sailor Satyendra Singh is missing.
The Chief of Naval Staff, Admiral Dinesh Tripathi inspected the scene the accident on 23 July and was briefed on the incident as well as the steps needed to bring Brahmaputra to an even keel and hopefully return to service. The 3,800 tonne Brahmaputra was commissioned in 2000 and was lead ship of three Type 16A frigates which were an enlarged and improved version of the Godavari class.
The Mumbai Naval Dockyard has an unfortunate history of dockyard accidents. In 2013 the submarine INS Sindhurakshak suffered a major fire and explosion and sank with the deaths of 18 sailors. In 2016 a sister-ship of Brahmaputra, INS Betwa came off her support blocks and went over onto her port side when refloating and undocking. In this incident two sailors were killed but the ship did return to service.
In a more positive development, on 23 July at the Goa Shipyard, the first of two Batch 4 Talwar class, the Triput, was launched. The Talwar class ships are improved Russian Project 1135/Krivak III class frigates. To date three Batch I and three Batch II ships have been delivered from Russia with two Batch III being constructed at the Yantar Shipyard in Kaliningrad, Russia.
