The ship changed its operational base, being redeployed to Taranto, after the first units of the Lupo class, deployed at Apulia, were progressively decommissioned due to age limits.

In 2002, after a brief paused to drydock, she carried out two important international activities, first the STANAVFORLANT, which lasted from 11 April to 7 July, followed by STANAVFORMED, from 9 September to 4 November.

In these two activities, the ship visited the ports of Suda in Crete, Aksaz, Turkey, Split in Croatia, Tunis in Tunisia.

From May of the same year until July, she visited the ports of Lisbon, Cádiz and Rota and then, after a brief stop in Taranto, she was unexpectedly called to the Indian Ocean and precisely to the Horn of Africa for the defense of the merchant traffic from piracy.

After giving assistance with the medical personnel on board, the Grenadier patrol boat escorted the merchant ship to the port of Djibouti where the shipwrecked were disembarked.

As in 2001, with the illegal immigrants recovered off the coast of Crotone, the ship returned to the headlines in Italy, where the news bounced around in the main newspapers.