French Armed Forces Minister Florence Parly said, “These four boats, known in France as SNLE (sous-marin nucléaire lanceur d’engin) “will replace the current [ones] without a break.”
Parly announced the program’s launch at the DGA’s hydrodynamic technologies centre at Val-de-Reuil. All the French Navy’s submarines have been designed and evaluated over the past 60 years here.
She said the subs would sail until 2090.
The contracting authorities are the DGA procurement agency (The Direction générale de l’armement (DGA;/: Directorate General of Armaments) and the Alternative Energies and Atomic Energy Commission. The project management will lie with the Naval Group and TechnicAtome, the prime contractor for the nuclear boiler room.
Parly said, the new submarines will be “slightly longer and heavier” than the current Le Triomphant class, which first sailed in 1995 and will continue to do so until 2050. She added that the vessels would “hear better and defend themselves better whilst at the same time being more silent: They will not make more noise than a school of shrimp.”
