Swath Charwin - range support ship

The small waterplane area twin hull (SWATH) CHARWIN was built in 1984 for commercial fishing. This 80 foot steel SWATH successfully harvested scallops off the East Coast of Florida. In 1985 the fishing gear was removed and the CHARWIN was marketed to the offshore oil industry. Because of the depressed state of offshore oil no orders were confirmed and the ship was laid up. In 1987, the Naval coastal Systems Center investigated using the CHARWIN as a range support ship for instrumentation develoµnent. CHARWIN was modified for this mission in May of 1988, and has been successful in that role operating out of Fort Lauderdale and Panama City, Florida. This paper describes the CHARWIN and its conversion and use as a range support vessel.