Named for Helge Ingstad, a Norwegian explorer, the Fridtjof Nansen class are capable of anti-air, anti-submarine and surface warfare.

On 8 November 2018, HNoMS Helge Ingstad was in a collision with the tanker Sola TS in Norwegian waters just outside Sture Terminal.

Based on the Alvaro de Bazan-class design, Izar (later Navantia) of Spain and Lockheed Martin were chosen to construct the vessel.

For anti-air warfare, the Fridtjof Nansens are equipped with an octuple American Mk 41 vertical launch system for 32 RIM-162 ESSM surface-to-air missiles located ahead of the forward superstructure and aft the single-mounted 76 mm (3 in) OTO Melara Super Rapid gun.

For signal defence, the class operates the Terma DL-12T decoy launcher and Loki torpedo countermeasure systems.

[7] The ship was ordered for construction on 23 June 2000 by Norway and built by the Spanish shipbuilders Navantia at Ferrol, Spain.

[9] From December 2013 to May 2014, Helge Ingstad was one of the escort ships for merchant vessels carrying chemical weapons from Syria to be destroyed.

[11] On 8 November 2018, while returning from a NATO exercise, she was navigating inshore waters north of Bergen at speeds of up to 17.4 knots (32.2 km/h; 20.0 mph).

After radio communication was established, and upon being asked to alter course to starboard, to avoid the 250-metre (820 ft), 112,939 t, Maltese-flagged oil tanker Sola TS, escorted by VSP Tenax, which had just left its berth, Helge Ingstad believed the vessel calling them to be one of the oncoming vessels they were tracking on radar.

By the time they realised their error they were within 400 metres (440 yd) of Sola TS and it was too late to avoid a collision.

[13] The collision caused severe damage to Helge Ingstad, which lost control of engine and steering, with a large breach along her side from the starboard torpedo launchers to the stern.

[17] This is the first incident of such scale in the Royal Norwegian Navy since 1994, when HNoMS Oslo was lost after it ran aground.

[18] Norwegian defence department's report found that 53 of 88 rules and "barriers" meant to avoid collisions were violated by the Helge Ingstad in this case.

[19] Unlike Helge Ingstad, Sola TS only suffered minor damage in its front and was never in danger of sinking.

The tanker subsequently sailed to a shipyard in Gdańsk for repairs and was back in regular service by late December 2018.

[23] Subsequently, on 13 November 2018 Rear Admiral Nils Andreas Stensoenes, head of Norway's navy announced that the wires had snapped overnight.

[25] Poor weather hampered salvage operations through December 2018; with the planned date to raise the ship being delayed until late January 2019.

[27][28] On 27 February 2019, due to weather concerns, the partially raised ship was moved to a location which is better protected from the elements, where further salvage work took place.

[29] The ship and the two heavy lift vessels (Rambiz and Gulliver) reached the Semco Maritime yard at Hanøytangen on 28 February 2019.

[30][31] Boarding parties consisting of some 300 people, including around 100 members of Helge Ingstad's original crew, assisted in pumping out the remaining water so that the ship could be placed on a barge and fully salvaged.

[36] On 14 May 2019 it was reported the cost of repairing Helge Ingstad would exceed US$1.4 billion, according to the Norwegian Armed Forces, implying that it would be nearly three times cheaper to build a new ship.

[62] The helmsman and the Norwegian Navy's foremost[52] expert on navigation at sea (Stein Egil Iversen), are some of the more[50] than 30 witnesses that have been scheduled to testify during the trial.