HMCS KINGSTON (700)
HMCS KINGSTON
The History of HMCS KINGSTON
HMCS Kingston (MM 700) was the lead ship of the twelve Kingston-class Maritime Coastal Defence Vessels and the first Royal Canadian Navy ship named for Kingston, Ontario.
The first warship built in Halifax in 32 years, she was laid down at Halifax Shipyards on 12 December 1994, launched on 12 August 1995, and commissioned in her namesake city on 21 September 1996. Homeported at CFB Halifax and crewed largely by naval reservists, she was designed for coastal patrol, mine countermeasures, training, fisheries and sovereignty work, and search and rescue. The class itself was named after her.
Her early years set the pattern for the whole class. In September 1998 she joined recovery operations after Swissair Flight 111 crashed off Peggy's Cove. In March 1999 she, HMCS Glace Bay and Anticosti crossed the Atlantic for NATO minesweeping exercise Blue Game in the Baltic, the smallest Canadian warships to make that passage since the Second World War. She trained reservists and naval cadets, conducted fisheries patrols, and worked with the RCMP. In July 2003 she received the first female commanding officer of a Canadian warship. That October, with HMCS Moncton, she helped recover two U.S. Marine Corps F-18 pilots after a mid-air collision.
The Bofors 40mm guns were removed from Canada's Kingston-class coastal defence vessel (MCDV) fleet in 2014, leaving the vessels relying on two 12.7mm (0.50 caliber) Browning M2 heavy machine guns for self-defense.
Later deployments took her far afield. She served repeatedly on Operation CARIBBE counter-narcotics patrols in the Caribbean. In 2014 she escorted the search that located one of Sir John Franklin's lost ships in the Arctic. She took part in Operation Nanook, made Great Lakes goodwill tours, and twice deployed to West Africa on Operation Projection and Exercise Obangame Express (2018-19), including the first visit by Canadian warships to Nigeria. In 2022 she and HMCS Summerside sailed to European waters under NATO after Russia's invasion of Ukraine, locating and detonating leftover Second World War mines.
After 29 years as flagship of the class, Kingston was paid off at Halifax on 3 October 2025 with several of her sisters.
HMCS KINGSTON Statistical Data
- Pendant: 700
- Type: Maritime Coastal Defence Vessel
- Class: Kingston
- Displacement: 970 tonnes
- Length: 55.31 m / 181.5 ft
- Width: 11.3 m / 37 ft
- Draught: 3.4 m / 11 ft
- Speed: 15 kts
- Compliment: 31-36 Officers and Crew
- Arms: 1 - 40mm Bofors (removed in 2014), 2 - 12.7 mm (.50 cal) machine gun
- Builder: Halifax Shipyards Ltd., Halifax, NS
- Keel Laid: 12-Dec-94
- Date Launched: 12-Aug-95
- Date Commissioned: 21-Sep-96
- Paid off: 03-Oct-25
More Images
HMCS Kingston off Quebec City.
HMCS Kingston (2010) (Wikipedia: Charny)