The first R/V Dr Fridtjof Nansen was built in 1974 as a fishery research vessel to the Norwegian VERITAS class IAI-stern trawler.

It served the Nansen Programme until 1993, surveying shelves and slopes of tropical and subtropical regions.

The principal dimensions of the vessel were:  LOA 46.35 m, width 10.3 m, depth 6.5 m.  She had a 1500 hp main engine and berths for 28 persons. All deck machinery was hydraulic and there were freezer- and cool rooms.

The deck machinery included split trawl winches and two hydraulic drums for trawl nets. With the use of combination trawl doors there was no delay in switching between bottom and mid-water trawling.

Originally, the vessel was also equipped for purse-seining, but this gear proved to be of little use in survey work and was removed during a refit in 1979.
Navigational equipment included satellite navigation systems.

The acoustic equipment included a 24 kHz sonar and 38.50 and 120 kHz echosounders.

Three generations of SIMRAD™ echosounders and integrators were used on the vessel.

The old first R/V Dr Fridtjof Nansen finished her last survey in June 1993 in Namibia and was sold.

The next vessel, bearing the same name, was commissioned in October 1993 and started operations in January 1994.