PLAN Fleet supply vessels

luosifen

Senior Member
Registered Member
Food onboard PLANS Type 903A Kekexilihu, improvements in technology allows them to store for longer than before (from half a month for leafy veggies to around 50 days, rooty vegetables for over 3 months). They even have icecream machines now and machines to process soybeans into fresh tofu/beancurd.

 

asif iqbal

Lieutenant General
Food onboard PLANS Type 903A Kekexilihu, improvements in technology allows them to store for longer than before (from half a month for leafy veggies to around 50 days, rooty vegetables for over 3 months). They even have icecream machines now and machines to process soybeans into fresh tofu/beancurd.


being at sea is boring and can have big effect on moral

one thing the sailors always look forward to is the food time

on a nice sunny day getting out on the deck with BBQ is always a great moral boaster

now with more and more flats decks we may see some BBQ out on top deck
 

Cloud_Nine_

Junior Member
Registered Member
Do we have any information on the third Type 901 AOE? I am only able to find satellite images of it under construction dating back to 2018.
 

ACuriousPLAFan

Brigadier
Registered Member
According to the tweet, the 4th hull of the Type 901-class fast replenishment ship has completed hull module merging in Guangzhou Shipyard since the work started September (last year). Now only the superstructure installation work remains before the ship could be launched.

Retweeted by @Deino so I post it here as well.

20230225_054137.jpg

But wait - If this is the 4th 901, where is the 3rd 901?
 

para80

Junior Member
Registered Member
Disclosure, that is my Twitter account.

I think these are SAR, basic supply and medical support hulls. Their overall configuration is in line with those roles. The problem is that "hospital ship" is a highly fluid definition including drastically different configs like 919, 920 and the US Mercy and Comfort vessels, which really are massive trauma centres triaging combat casualties in their original role and concept.

I am not suggesting any nefarious use such as for outright military purposes (ammo replenishment etc) but simply that they will probably also see use in establishing and supporting infrastructure on SCS islands etc.
 

Blitzo

Lieutenant General
Staff member
Super Moderator
Registered Member
Disclosure, that is my Twitter account.

I think these are SAR, basic supply and medical support hulls. Their overall configuration is in line with those roles. The problem is that "hospital ship" is a highly fluid definition including drastically different configs like 919, 920 and the US Mercy and Comfort vessels, which really are massive trauma centres triaging combat casualties in their original role and concept.

I am not suggesting any nefarious use such as for outright military purposes (ammo replenishment etc) but simply that they will probably also see use in establishing and supporting infrastructure on SCS islands etc.

Even then, I think the tweet is a bit odd as it seems to suggest that hospital ships (or rather medical ships) need to be a certain size to qualify as such, and that if they're smaller then they would somehow be more.... Multirole and less focused on the primary medical mission?

These are some internal pics of the ship class, and it is fairly consistent with a ship providing medical facilities.
(Other articles on the ship when it was commissioned state it has 100 beds, with three OTs, a CT, endoscopy, and services like MH, ORL, ophthal is a pretty legit secondary center level facility)




And the PLAN also has for much of its history operated many smaller medical ships too.

866_25_7498_29288187eecb6b58.jpgNorth01_1246154934_33181.jpgbei1222407748_81400.jpg25_129163_a4c1b81c1df9a5e.jpg


Sometimes you don't need a big tertiary center general hospital, sometimes a secondary center or primary/GP/urgent care clinic is enough, not to mention the considerations of ship readiness/deployability for larger versus smaller ships, etc.
 
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