United States Navy MH-60R helicopters on the Spanish assault ship 'Castilla' L-52

This Monday, the United States Navy released images of a new bilateral exercise with the Spanish Navy.

A deployment of US MH-60R helicopters on the Spanish ship 'Juan Carlos I'
MH-60R Seahawk: this is the new multi-mission helicopter that the Spanish Navy will receive

These images, disseminated through the multimedia portal DVIDShub.net of the United States Armed Forces, were taken on April 27 and show U.S. Navy MH-60R helicopters aboard the amphibious assault ship "Castilla" L-52, of the "Galicia" class.

The aircraft seen in these images belong to Helicopter Maritime Strike Squadron (HSM) 79 "Griffins," a unit created on June 2, 2016, initially based at Naval Air Station North Island in San Diego, California, flying from the aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln (CVN-72). It is assigned to the Sixth Fleet and equipped exclusively with MH-60R multi-purpose helicopters. Its radio call sign is "Sentinel."

This unit is the successor to Helicopter Anti-Submarine Squadron (HS) 9 "Sea Griffins", a unit created in 1956, disbanded in 1993, and equipped with SH-3H Sea King helicopters. The "Sea Griffins" became world-famous for their appearance in the film "The Final Countdown" (1980), an excellent movie in which the aircraft carrier USS Nimitz (CVN-68) traveled back in time to 1941, in the moments leading up to the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor.

The HSM-79, equipped with ten MH-60R helicopters, has been based in Rota, Spain since July 2022, where there had been no U.S. Navy helicopter unit since 2005. Rota is a naval base jointly operated by the Spanish and U.S. naval forces. The HSM-79 is currently the only U.S. Navy Forward Deployed Naval Forces - Europe (FDNF-E) squadron based on the continent.

The HSM-79's MH-60R multipurpose helicopters are assigned anti-submarine warfare (ASW) and anti-surface warfare (SUW) missions, usually operating from the Arleigh Burke-class destroyers that are part of the United States missile defense shield in Rota.

A few weeks ago we saw the MH-60Rs of HSM-79 operating from the aircraft carrier "Juan Carlos I" L-61 of the Spanish Navy, during a bilateral exercise carried out on March 18. As I mentioned then, the Spanish Navy expects to receive its first MH-60R Seahawk helicopters in October of this year, from a batch of eight units whose purchase was announced three years ago. These helicopters will be assigned to the 10th Squadron of the Naval Air Arm (FLOAN), based in Rota, and will replace the aging SH-60B Seahawk helicopters, the first of which arrived in Spain on December 22, 1988.

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Photos: U.S. Navy.