New commander for the frigate "Mecklenburg-Vorpommern"

From a press release by the PIZ at Rostock Naval Command:

On Thursday, 28 September 2023 at 10 a.m., the commander of the 2nd Frigate Squadron, Frigate Captain Olliver Pfennig (48), will hand over command of the frigate "Mecklenburg-Vorpommern" from Frigate Captain Hendrik Wißler (44) to Frigate Captain Wolfgang Johannes Eckmüller (46).

Frigate Captain Wißler took over the post of commander on the "Mecklenburg-Vorpommern" in 2020. "I look back on an extremely intense time, which presented quite a few challenges with the coronavirus pandemic and the effects of the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Today, I am above all proud of my crew, who have risen again and again after setbacks over the past three years, fulfilled all orders and represented the navy on NATO's northern flank for more than a year since May 2022," said the outgoing commander. In future, he will become a consultant in the Bundeswehr Planning Office and will therefore be responsible for multinational defence planning and capability cooperation.

His successor, Frigate Captain Eckmüller, previously served in the "Joint Forces Command Brunssum" in the Netherlands, one of the two European NATO commands. Until 2015, he served in Operational Flotilla 2 on the frigates "Emden", "Hamburg" and "Brandenburg" as well as on the staff of Operational Flotilla 2. "I am delighted to be returning to the fleet after broadening my horizons in a number of assignments outside the navy," says the new commander. "I was deployed to the Operations Command, the Command and Staff College and the Strategic Reconnaissance Command, among others. However, I am even more looking forward to getting to know the ship and the crew over the next few weeks and, in particular, to being able to contribute the experience from my last assignment to the fleet in the future," he explains his anticipation of the upcoming assignment.