Operators Russian Navy | Building 4 | |
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Name Buyan class or Project 21630 Builders Almaz Shipyard, St. Petersburg Succeeded by Karakurt-class corvette Subclasses Project 21631 "Buyan-M"
Project 21632 "Tornado" | ||
The Buyan-class corvette was designed by Zelenodolsk Design and designated Project 21630 by the Russian Government. This is one of the newest corvettes of the Russian Navy. The first ship of her class, Astrakhan, was commissioned in September 2006, and assigned to the Caspian Flotilla.
In August 2010 some information about newly modified Project 21631 ships was published. The lead ship of this project, Grad Sviyazhsk, was laid down on 27 August 2010. This ship is a missile version of Project 21630 "Buyan" small-size gunnery ship and is dubbed as "Buyan-M". This ship of Project 21631 is dedicated to the defense of national economic zones and its main purpose is engagement of surface warships. This is going to be an up-to-date ship armed with missile and artillery weapons, and equipped with electronic countermeasure equipment. The Buyan-M class corvettes are said to be armed with nuclear-capable Kalibr cruise missiles (NATO code name Sizzler) with a claimed range of at least 1,500 km.
The yard will build five ships including the lead one, since a contract was approved by the Russian defense ministry on 26 May 2010.
One of the export variants of Project 21630, called Project 21632 "Tornado", will be purchased by Kazakhstan.
Service
In October 2015, Grad Sviyazhsk, Uglich and Velikiy Ustyug in company with the Gepard-class frigate Dagestan, launched cruise missiles at targets in Syria. The missiles flew nearly 1,500 kilometres (930 mi) over Iran and Iraq and struck targets in Raqqa and Aleppo provinces (controlled by the Islamic State) as well as Idlib province (controlled by the al-Qaeda-linked Nusra Front). According to Pentagon officials, several of these Kalibr-NK cruise missiles fired from Russian ships crashed in Iran and didn't make it to their intended targets in Syria. Iranian TV reported that an "unidentified flying object" crashed and exploded in a village near the Iranian city of Takab.
On 13 February 2016, Zelenyy Dol was reported to have been dispatched from the Black Sea Fleet to serve as part of the Mediterranean task force which is providing support for Russia's intervention in the Syrian Civil War.
On 25 October 2016 two vessels (Zelenyy Dol and Serpukhov) are reported by media to be deployed to the Baltic sea.