French frigate Doudart de Lagrée

Designed to navigate overseas, the escorts of the Doudart de Lagrée were fully air-conditioned.

A posting on a Aviso-escort was a boarding sought after by sailors because it guaranteed campaigns overseas and visits to the country.

Four other similar units were built at Ateliers et Chantiers de Bretagne (ACB) in Nantes for the Portuguese Navy under the class name João Belo.[1]

All French units were decommissioned in the mid-1990s. Three ships were sold to the Uruguayan Navy.[2][3]

In 1984, Commandant Rivière underwent a redesign to become an experimentation building. It retained only a single triple platform of 550mm anti-submarine torpedo tubes and all the rest of the armament was landed, replaced by a single 40mm anti-aircraft gun and two 12.7mm machine guns.

The Doudart de Lagrée was laid down in March 1960 at Arsenal de Lorient, Lorient. Launched on 15 April 1961 and commissioned on 1 May 1963.

From 1981 to 1983, as a preserve of Joan of Arc, she carried out 22 patrols in the Persian Gulf.[4]

In 1986, leading up to the Gulf War, she evacuated French nationals to Aden and a port base in Djibouti.[4]

She was decommissioned in 1992, and her number was changed to Q686. She served as a breakwater in Brest from 1994 to 1999.

The Doudart de Lagrée was sunk as target on 29 November 1999.