Primed for littoral force

A new $12m super barge ramp on Smiths Creek will be a heavy hitter in Cairns’ turnkey infrastructure arsenal capable of servicing and maintaining the army’s next generation littoral force.
The state-of-the-art Southern Barge Ramp was delivered as an element of the Cairns Marine Precinct Common User Facility to increase the region’s commercial and industrial maritime capacity as part of Ports North’s broader precinct upgrade. With the capacity to support vessels and barges up to 100m in length, Cairns’ ramp would be able to play a major role in Defence’s Land 8710 program with its ability to take every vehicle in the Army’s inventory up to and including the Abrams main battle tanks.
Advance Cairns CEO Jennifer Spilsbury said while a decision was still pending, Cairns’ reputation as the major maritime maintenance and sustainment hub in Northern Australia placed it in the box seat for the new Landing Craft Battalion to be based here.

“This is a new program. The landing craft we’re talking about haven’t existed before and supersede the Vietnam-era landing craft being phased out,” Mrs Spilsbury said.
“This is a new era for the Army – nothing like Land 8710 exists so it’s very exciting for Cairns to play a leading role.”
Mrs Spilsbury said the $250m upgrade of HMAS Cairns, the two new wharves recently constructed in Cairns to provide additional in-water maintenance capacity and available strategic port land was in place for the Army’s larger and more complex fleet of watercraft.
“The investment that has been made in Cairns’ marine precinct in infrastructure, workforce and training over decades is going to reap big benefits that will not only drive our economy but help the Federal Government in its national security and soft diplomacy objectives.”
Advance Cairns met with Minister for Defence Industry and Pacific Island Affairs Pat Conroy in Canberra last month and again during his recent visit to the Far North to announce at least two Offshore Patrol Vessels would be homeported here.
“Our message is that we are ready, we have capacity to do more, and we are geographically best placed.”
Mrs Spilsbury said the new littoral fleet was a massive step forward in comparison to the LCM-8s, with the Landing Craft Mediums able to travel up to 2000 nautical miles allowing them to operate independently across the Indo-Pacific rather than keeping close to shore.
“These new landing craft are longer, heavier and travel further – we can accommodate them, right now.
“With the landing craft, it’s not just about having boots on the ground. These vessels play a massive role in the humanitarian work that Australia does in the Pacific. Cargo doesn’t just mean troops, it often means supplies to remote communities.
“The Far North has everything to offer as the homeport, including being a great place to live.”