HMAS Melville (A246), Hydrographic Survey Ship, 5 Aug 2025.

‪@shipsintropicaloz‬ HMAS Melville (A 246) will be decommissioned on 8 August after 24 years of service in the Royal Australian Navy (RAN).
Melville and its sistership HMAS Leeuwin (A 245) were built in Cairns and commissioned into the RAN on 27 May 2000 as hydrographic survey ships.
It will likely be the last such vessel to serve in the Navy.
While the Leeuwin class was originally slated to be directly replaced in the later stages of Project Sea 1905, the project's cancellation means that the task of surveying Australia’s waters now falls to industry.
Their smaller counterparts, the four strong Paluma class coastal survey ships, were retired progressively between 2021 and 2023. The planned decommissioning of Melville leaves Leeuwin as the RAN’s lone dedicated hydrographic survey vessel.
"From 2024, around $1 billion will be invested over the decade through the HydroScheme Industry Partnership Program to collect, collate and produce nautical charts and publications within the Australian Charting Area with the Australian Hydrographic Office,” states the 2024 Integrated Investment Plan (IIP).
Melville will be the third RAN vessel to be decommissioned this year following the retirements of HMAS Huon and HMAS Anzac in May.
Another Huon class coastal minehunter is also set to leave the fleet this year.

[@peternoakes4408]

If what I think is happening I think it is a hypocrisy of this government.

[@shipsintropicaloz]

I believe your question is about Australia's defence. While originally built to map the coastline of Australia including underwater depths, HMAS Melville was additionally assigned to help with Operation Sovereign Borders in late 2001. She has a helicopter deck and is armed with 2 × 12.7 mm machine guns. Scheduled to be decommissioned today, with her hydrographic duties to be replaced by private industry, it appears this is one less armed vessel available to help protect our borders.