SPS Patiño (A14)

The SPS Patiño A14 is a replenishment oiler of the Spanish Navy. It was named after the Spanish navy minister José Patiño Rosales, who reorganized the fleet on the orders of Philip V of Spain.

Design
The Patiño is a product of cooperation between Koninklijke Marine and Armada Española. The design of the ship is similar to the HNLMS Amsterdam (A836) of the Dutch Navy, the vessels were developed in cooperation. The Patiño was mostly a civilian design.

Propulsion
SPS Patiño is fitted with two Navantia / Burmeister and Wein 16V40/45 diesel engines rated to 17.6MW Sustained power. The engines drive a single shaft with a five-blade controllable pitch propeller.

Electronics
The Patiño is fitted with three navigation-surface search and helicopter control radars operating at I-band. The countermeasures equipment includes: four mk36 SRBOC (super rapid blooming offboard chaff), six-barrelled launchers from Lockheed Martin Sippican der four infrared decoys and chaff, distraction and deflection of incoming anti-ship missiles to a range of 4 km; an AN / SLQ-25A Nixie Towed torpedo Decoy system from Argon ST of Newington, Virginia som two Towed units to emit acoustic signals from an onboard transmitter, and an Aldebaran Electronic Support Measures / Electronic Countermeasures (ESM / ECM) system from Spain's Indra Group.

Armament
The SPS Patiño´s weapons system include two Oerlikon 20mm guns and the vessel is fitted for two Izar FABA Systems Meroka 20mm close-in weapon system (CIWS). The guns having a rate of four of 1.440 rounds a minute and range of up to 2.000 m. The Meroka CIWS includes infrared camera and video auto-tracker.

Aircraft
The SPS Patiño A14 is designed to carry up to 5 helicopters. It has a normal complement of only three 3 Sikorsky SH-3 Sea Kings.

Capabilities
The ships are able to support a fleet of up to 21 days, and is equipped with six fuel pumps with a capacity of 600 cubic meters of fuel per minute. A typical fleet consists of 5 escort carriers and about 20 aircraft.

Diesel (F76) (spread over 16 different tanks): 8750 tons Aviation fuel (F44): 1200 tons (Holland rebuilt in 2003 a tank to contain F76) Freshwater (1 tank): 142 ton Food (over 1 tørproviantrum, 1 cold room and freezer 1): 1100 tons Ammunition (spread over 5 rooms): 350 ton

Operation Sharp Guard, 1996
The Patiño participated in Operation Sharp Guard, to support the trade embargo against the former Yugoslavia.

Operation Allied Action, 1998
In 1998, SPS Patiño participated in Operation Allied Action during the Kosovo War.

The Patiño has also involved a long series of international exercises such as Joint Warrior and Seattle Mariner and has also sailed as part of SNMG1 and SNMG2.

Operation Enduring Freedom
In 2002, Patiño and the Spanish frigate Navarra took part of Operation Enduring Freedom. In December 2002, the media spotlight directed at the Spanish ships as they boarded the North Korean merchant ship So San, which was pretending to be a Colombian trading ship.

So San, sailed without flag and tried to steer elusive. After four warning shots across the ship's bows, Spanish marksmen hit and cut an sling crossing the deck to make room for inserting a boarding team by helicopter. On board the ship the Spanish marines found 15 Scud missiles with conventional warheads of 250 kg, 23 tanks of nitric acid and 85 drums of other chemicals. Yemen stated that the cargo belonged to them and that they protested against the seizure of the ship. It subsequently emerged that the Yemeni defense had purchased the missiles legally from North Korea and that they therefore had no legal authority to detain the ship. The Allies had to let the ship proceed.

Somalia, 2010 to Present
The SPS Patiño was deployed and operates as part of the European Union's Operation Atalanta security mission. The EU force NAVFOR, a multinational mission to protect ships, patrols the region in the perilous shipping route off the coast of Somalia. The Patino was the NAVFOR flagship.

On 8 December 2010, SPS Patiño arrived off Somalia and became the flagship of the operation under Rear Admiral Juan Rodriguez on 14 December. Her role as the flagship lasted until 21 January 2011. By the end of November 2011 the vessel returned to the Indian Ocean to take her second tour at Operation Atalanta. As a replenishment ship she supported other vessels of the operation with oil and other supplies and also escorted ships with humanitarian help to Somalia.

12 January Piracy Incident
In the early morning of 12 January 2012, SPS Patiño was attacked by Somali pirates, apparently under the assumption that the ship was just a commercial vessel. The Spanish naval vessel fought off a gun attack by the pirates. SPS Patiño then chased by helicopter the attackers and captured six of them while one was reported killed. It had been escorting a ship carrying food aid to Somalia for the World Food Programme.