TASMANIA: AUSTRALIA’S MARITIME STATE & GATEWAY TO THE SOUTH

By Steve Gilmore AM CSC, RADM (Rtd),

Tasmanian Defence Advocate

Geography often has a significant part to play in the way a community evolves, lives, works and contributes to Australia and the world. Tasmania is most definitely blessed in its location and physical circumstance. This has in turn had a defining impact on life in Australia’s southernmost state.

The Mount Pleasant Radio Observatory, owned and operated by University of Tasmania, is located 20 km east of Hobart in Cambridge. It is home to three radio astronomy antennas and the Grote Reber Museum. © UTAS.

Two important aspects underpin Tasmania’s focus and subsequent expertise in regard to its contribution to the defence of our country. Firstly, as an island, Tasmania is Australia’s only ‘maritime state’. Tasmanians have had to develop a close association with the sea and master its use.

The second defining outcome of Tasmania’s location is its ‘gateway status’ to the south. It is our nation’s most southerly landmass and as such acts as a natural base for activities that require proximity to the Southern Ocean, Antarctica and to the space over this vast region of the globe.

Isolation has founded innovation and a cooperative approach to solve the numerous issues associated with living on an island. Blessed with an abundance of critical raw materials such as an array of native timbers (highly suitable for ship manufacture), various key minerals and an abundance of fine arable land, primary and manufacturing industry in Tasmania developed quickly – it simply had to in order to survive and then thrive!

It is therefore no surprise that Tasmanian companies and institutions are in fact now generating world-leading knowledge, products and services relating to the maritime domain. There is a notable concentration of many of Australia’s national marine science and research institutions in Tasmania, which clearly reflects the state’s competitive advantage in this domain.

Tasmania is home to the Australian Maritime College, the University of Tasmania’s (UTAS) Defence and Maritime Innovation & Design Precinct (funded by the Department of Defence) and separate Institute of Marine and Antarctic Studies (IMAS), the Australian ‘Blue Economy’ Cooperative Research Centre (CRC), the Commonwealth Science and Industrial Research Organisation’s (CSIRO) Marine National Facility (including the homeporting of our national ocean research vessel the R/V Investigator) and the Oceans and Atmosphere centre, Headquarters of the Southern Ocean Observing System (SOOS) and the Integrated Maritime Observing System (IMOS), the Australian Antarctic Division (including homeporting of Australia’s new 25,000t national Icebreaker, Resupply and Research Vessel RSV Nuyina), and the Centre for Antarctic, Remote and Maritime Medicine (CARMM).

The French Navy’s Antarctic support vessel FS L’Astrolabe is also base ported from Hobart during the southern summer months. Many other nations which work in the Antarctic and the Southern Ocean also utilise Hobart for logistic support purposes. Tasmania’s latitude places the state in an important position regarding our nation’s southern approaches. Whilst Tasmania provides a ‘launch pad’ for maritime related activities which focus on access to Antarctica and the vast Southern Ocean, the state is also ideally suited to space domain awareness - most notably for satellites and space debris which have polar orbits.

Founded on the knowledge and skills developed as Australia’s ‘maritime state’, several specialist companies have emerged and are providing often nationally unique solutions to Defence and primes nationally and internationally.

Perhaps best known is Taylor Bros, which has grown significantly from its Hobart-based headquarters and production facilities. Taylor Bros has been involved in numerous ship construction projects for both the Royal Australian Navy and the Royal New Zealand Navy. This association with Defence began in 2004 when the company were contracted to provide accommodation related outfitting for the RNZN Protector-class Offshore Patrol Vessels (OPVs) being constructed by BAE Systems (then Tenix) in Melbourne. Taylor Bros has made significant contributions to the Air Warfare Destroyer project, Canberra-class LHDs, Supply-class replenishment ships and is now as a partner company in the Arafuraclass OPV project. The company has established footprints in both SA and WA to meet these contracts with numerous locals employed from each of these states.

Liferaft Systems Australia (LSA) is another example of Tasmanian maritime expertise which routinely contributes capability on the world stage. Pioneering the design and manufacture of Marine Escape Systems (MES) and large capacity liferafts in 1992, LSA are now global leaders (and Australia’s only manufacturer) in provision of this capability to both the defence and commercial sectors. The LSA’s MES is the only approved (self-supporting/independent) system in the world which evacuates personnel directly from the vessel into large capacity liferafts via an inclined slide.

Pivot Maritime International (PMI) is yet another company on the international stage. As Australia’s only designer and manufacturer of bridge simulation systems (and one of only six in the world), PMI has more than 25 years’ experience and a range of systems that vary from full size to portable which can be located at the waterfront, or increasingly, onboard ships. PMI simulators are now used in 10 navies across the globe.

CBG Systems is another example of specialist skills and capability which are an outcome of the maritime environment that reflects Tasmania. The company specialises in fire, thermal and acoustic insulation, specialist antenna systems and signature management. Adapting commercial maritime capability into the defence sector has seen CBG products grow in their application with their quite unique sovereign products now fitted to several RAN classes of ships.

AMC’s Towing Tank is the largest and only commercially operating facility of its type within Australasia. The Towing Tank is a fundamental tool utilised by naval architects and other engineering professionals for conducting physical model experiments within a controlled environment. © UTAS.

Similarly, Muir Engineering near Hobart, is a unique sovereign capability which provides its services to Australia and the world – both in the commercial and defence sectors. Exporting to over 50 countries their product has become standard equipment onboard numerous commercial vessels of up to 160m. Successfully adapting and evolving these products have seen Muir become a key Australian defence supplier with their systems fitted to Guardian, Armidale, Cape and Pacific-class patrol boats as well as Leeuwin-class hydrographic ships. Muir is a supplier to the Arafura-class OPVs project.

With its genesis in the design and production of ‘durable products for harsh environments’, PFG Group is another extraordinary maritime company that has grown from the basis of its Tasmanian location. With local maritime operators across the aquaculture sector and marine police service requiring support vessels, landing craft, rescue boats and tactical watercraft that must operate in the harshest of southern conditions, PFG Group is now a leading, multi-sector, multi-platform technology focussed manufacturing business. Its ‘flagship’ product is ‘The Sentinel’ which, because of its advanced polymer hull material - High Density Polyethylene or HDPE - and unique, highly adaptable design characteristics, combines to provide what is a ‘fifth generation’ tactical watercraft for Defence. Very few companies in Australia or across the globe are producing vessels underpinned by the multiple capability discriminators presented by HDPE. SPACE AMBITIONS

Tasmania’s latitude places the state in an important position regarding Australia’s southern approaches. Whilst Tasmania provides a ‘launch pad’ for maritime-related activities which focus on access to Antarctica and the vast Southern Ocean, the state is also ideally suited to space domain awareness - most notably for satellites and space debris which have polar orbits.

The recent formal partnership between the UTAS, Hensoldt Defence Australia, and the Tasmanian government has signalled the formation of the ‘Southern Guardian’ capability.

For several decades, UTAS has been building an impressive array of space infrastructure and expertise. Their network of radio telescopes takes advantage of our southern geography, making Tasmania perfectly placed to observe and track near-earth objects such as satellites and space debris.

Building on a memorandum or understanding between the Australian Space Agency and Tasmanian government in 2019, the new ‘Team Tasmania’ (comprising UTAS, Hensoldt Defence Australia and the state government) aims to capitalise on our southern location and provide another unique capability. This is a great example of the collaborative connection with other states in provision of national Defence capability with a southern focus. The UTAS owned system of arrays has sites in SA, WA and the NT,

which together, will provide the network for this capability. OPERATION SOUTHERN DISCOVERY

Defence describes Operation Southern Discovery as “the Australian Defence Force contribution to the whole-ofgovernment, Department of Environment and Energy-led activity in the Antarctic Region - the Australian Antarctic Program. It is an enduring peacetime activity in support of the Australian

Antarctic Division. It includes Australia’s national interests, which are based on the region’s scientific, environmental, strategic and economic importance.

Operation Southern Discovery covers approximately 7% of the world’s surface and includes Antarctic locations, the Southern Ocean south of 60 degrees, the internationally recognised

Australian exclusive economic zone of

Macquarie Island as well as the territory of Heard Island and McDonald Island (HIMI)”.

Commander Australian Contingent (COMASC) for Operation Southern

Discovery is permanently based in Hobart and is allocated to Commander No 29 SQN RAAF at Anglesea Barracks. Of the various ADF activities that are conducted within this operation, provision of a logistics air bridge to Antarctica is routinely conducted by RAAF C-17A Globemaster aircraft from Hobart International Airport.

In recognition of this important activity and its evolving nature, the 2020 Force Structure Plan allocates funding to expand and upgrade facilities at Hobart airport to support increased ADF and civilian long-range operations in the Southern Ocean.

Tasmania has in the past made an exceptional (albeit often unknown or unacknowledged) contribution to Defence. The focus has always been on what we do best and how to contribute to national efforts most effectively.

The cooperative approach, quiet professional mastery, innovation and every evolving determination, is what leads me to conclude that Tassie is now ‘reporting for duty’ as Australia steps up to realise our national Defence capability ambitions. Based on the existing interactions, particularly in the shipbuilding and space domains, it is likely there is an increasing prospect of further Tasmania-Western Australia industry collaboration, as we seek to realise Defence capability requirements.

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www.cse-crosscom.com.au T: (03) 6323 8800 E: contacttas@cse-crosscom.com.au A: 47-49 McKenzie Street, Mowbray, TAS, 7248