During the war the navy increased its fleet of larger vessels by introducing two locally built Jayasagara class offshore patrol vessels. It did suffer the loss of several ships in the 1990s to sea tiger attacks by suicide crafts such as in the sinking of SLNS "Sagarawardena" and SLNS "Ranaviru" and the use of suicide frogmen such as in the bombing of SLNS "Sooraya" and SLNS "Ranasuru". Due to the treat posed by the sea tigers the navy had to undertake convoy duty to escort shipping to the Jaffna peninsula to which all land routes were controlled by the LTTE. In order keep supply lines open to Jaffna, the navy employed several auxiliary ships. It also deployed auxiliary ships to support FACs.