The Navy’s third Littoral Combat Ship (LCS 3), the future USS Fort Worth, has begun her journey to commissioning in Texas and on to her eventual homeport of San Diego.
The LCS got underway Monday from the Marinette Marine Corp. shipyard in Marinette, Wisc., on the way to her commissioning site in Galveston, Texas. The ship’s commissioning is set for Sept. 22.
Lockheed Martin [LMT] and partner Marinette Marine build the Freedom (LCS 1) variant of the LCS, while Austal USA manufactures the second variant based on the USS Independence (LCS 2).
The Navy accepted delivery of the steel, semi-planing, mono-hull Fort Worth two months ago (Defense Daily, June 7).
Before getting under way, the Navy’s Board of Inspection and Survey (INSURV) conducted acceptance trials aboard Forth Worth. INSURV found the ship to be “highly capable, well-built and inspection ready,” and recommended the vessel be accepted, the Navy said in a statement.
Rear Adm. James Murdoch, program executive officer for Littoral Combat Ships, said: “The ship’s builders and crew have done an exceptional job preparing Fort Worth for sailaway. This ship is incredibly well built and will provide a tremendous capability to the Fleet.”
A number of design changes have been incorporated in LCS 3 based on lessons learned from the first LCS class ship, USS Freedom. These changes are now part of the baseline design and will be incorporated into future ships of the class prior to construction.
The LCS is a high-speed, agile, shallow-draft, focused-mission surface combatant designed for operation in near-shore environments yet it is fully capable of open-ocean operation.
Fort Worth also is designed to defeat asymmetric anti-access threats such as mines, quiet diesel submarines and fast surface craft.
The 387-foot Fort Worth will have reconfigurable payloads, called mission packages, which can be changed out quickly. The packages focus on three mission areas: mine countermeasures, surface warfare and anti-submarine warfare.
In addition to its three primary warfare missions, the ship’s capabilities and suitability to conduct lower-end missions will free up more expensive, multi-mission cruisers and destroyers to conduct higher-end missions.
“We look forward to adding another LCS to the fleet,” said Vice Adm. Thomas Copeman, commander, Naval Surface Force, U.S. Pacific Fleet, “and eagerly await her arrival to San Diego.”
The Lockheed Martin team now has Milwaukee (LCS 5), Detroit (LCS 7), Little Rock (LCS 9), and Sioux City (LCS 11) under construction in Marinette.
Austal USA is constructing Independence-variant ships Coronado (LCS 4), Jackson (LCS 6), Montgomery (LCS 8), Gabrielle Giffords (LCS 10) and Omaha (LCS 12) at the company’s shipyard in Mobile, Ala.