HADR
The vessel would be perfect for humanitarian assistance and disaster relief or HADR with a ship that has a 1000sqm medical facility with 4 operating theatres, 10 intensive care beds, and 17 ward bed, which during and HADR would be invaluable. The vehicle bay and landing craft able to take all the heavy aid and equipment ashore, and if port facilities are damaged like Canterbury can use LCM's and helo's to land the equipment and personnel , and with the five helicopter landing spots and able to operate 5 helicopters at a time would greatly speed getting personal and equipment ashore or any evacuation or medical emergency.
The NH-90 can operate directly from the ship no matter where the vessel is, meaning if (for whatever reason from storm damage to flooding) and there is no suitable landing area to setup base of operations the ship can still operate all helos allowing the operation and aid to continue unimpeded. The ship is a mobile base of operations. One area where HMNZS Canterbury lags is while she can carry x3 NH-90 and x1 SeaSprite, the NH-90 have to be launched and then operate from a forward land base (while she can operate one NH-90 at a time). With the Endurance 170 you would not have to worry about this as you have a mobile floating helo base with 5 helo landing pads. This would be an immense improvement over the current capability of Canterbury.
1000sqm medical facility with 4 operating theatres, 10 intensive care beds, and 17 ward bed, which during and HADR would be invaluable.
On the reverse, the ship operating all helos, and can still operate helo's from other ships and including any civilian helicopters that are helping in the operations.
Endurance 160 design which the 170 evolved from.
The command, control and communication systems and the planning spaces would be perfect for planning and organising of the relief aid throughout the operation.
The vessel can carry 400+ troops so in a HADR situation that is 400 beds to evacuation people. This alone is a huge and major enhancement compared to the capabilities of HMNZS Canterbury can offer which is 250.
She has a draught not much more than to Canterbury of about 6.6m so still can get into pretty shallow ports, or damaged channels and ports etc (HMNZS Canterbury 5.4m) However compared to the same size vessel of HMNZS Aotearoa which 8.5m.
