Senegalese Navy tests anti-ship missile for the first time

Cayor had anti-ship missiles fitted during a visit to Casablanca, Morocco, in May. (Marine Nationale Sénégalaise)

The Senegalese Navy has carried out its first anti-ship missile test firing, it was announced on 9 November.

Radio Television Senegal (RTS) showed offshore patrol vessel (OPV) Cayor launching a small anti-ship missile at a target that appeared to be one of the navy's decommissioned CTM landing craft loaded with shipping containers to enlarge its radar signature. The containers were clearly hit by a live warhead, although the landing craft was not sunk.

RTS reported that the target was 15 km away from the vessel and its coverage included a view from a camera on another vessel that was transmitted back to Cayor to show the impact. The screen gave the time and date of the test as the morning of 9 November.

Commissioned in October 2024, Cayor was the last of three 58 m OPVs that Kership, a joint venture by the French shipyards Pirou and Naval Group, built for Senegal. While the first, Walo, was commissioned in August 2023, RTS reported that this was the first such test carried out by the Senegalese Navy.

“This is historic,” Rear Admiral Abdou Sène, the chief of staff of the Senegalese Navy, said in the RTS coverage. “The navy has entered the select circle of navies that are capable of implementing such a complex and modern weapon system in a sovereign manner. Everything that has been done in this context, whether the preparation, the logistics, [or] the security measures for clearing the area, the whole process has been carried out in a sovereign manner.”