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Navy orders new destroyers

Construction of the first two DDG 1000 Zumwalt-class advanced destroyers is set to begin after the U.S. Navy awarded its two primary shipbuilders $2.8 billion in contracts Feb. 14.

General Dynamics will build the Zumwalt — DDG 1000 — at Bath Iron Works in Bath, Maine, while Northrop Grumman will build the yet-to-be-named DDG 1001 at its Ingalls shipyard in Pascagoula, Miss.

The Zumwalt is set to be delivered by Bath in June 2013, while Northrop’s DDG 1001 is to follow in July 2014. Northrop and General Dynamics are cooperating in completing the final, detailed design of the destroyers. Northrop, the original lead contractor for the program, will be responsible for building the DDG 1001 and the superstructure and hangar for the Bath-built DDG 1000. Bath will build the mid-forebody hull section of the DDG 1001.

A $3.3 billion price tag is attached to each of the new ships, although the Navy hopes the cost will drop as further ships are ordered. Independent government analysts, however, routinely forecast a much higher cost, with some estimates topping $5 billion and more.

The Navy intends to buy a total of seven ships of the class, which the service says it needs to dominate littoral waters and provide long-range and persistent fire support for troops ashore.

Each of the new ships was included in the 2007 defense budget, and the Navy is asking for the third ship in the class in the 2009 budget proposal sent to Congress on Feb. 4.

The Zumwalt-class ships feature a unique and stealthy tumble-home hull form, electric drive propulsion and new radars. In addition to missile cells, the destroyers also will mount two 155-millimeter (6.1-inch) advanced gun systems, the largest guns designed to be fitted on a new warship since the 1950s.

The 600-foot-long destroyers will have a beam of about 81 feet and draw about 28 feet of water. Only 142 sailors will man the highly automated ships.

By comparison, the latest Arleigh Burke DDG 51-class destroyer displaces 9,200 tons, is 511 feet long with a beam of 66 feet and has a crew of about 360.

The Zumwalt-class ships will be the largest surface combatants built by the U.S. since the nuclear-powered cruiser Long Beach was commissioned in 1961. Only the four 28,300-ton Kirov-class battle cruisers built by the Soviet Union during the Cold War were larger.

The Navy has been developing the DDG 1000 design since the mid-1990s, when the class was conceived as the Land Attack Destroyer member of the Surface Combatant 21 family of ships. The program was cast as the DD21 project, then DD(X) and finally DDG 1000.

Northrop and General Dynamics each have three major shipyards. Northrop’s primary shipbuilding facilities are Ingalls at Pascagoula; Avondale at New Orleans; and Newport News Shipbuilding in Newport News, Va. The company currently builds nuclear aircraft carriers and submarines at Newport News; destroyers, amphibious ships and Coast Guard cutters at Ingalls; and amphibious ships at Avondale.

The major General Dynamics shipyards are at Bath; Electric Boat (EB) in Groton, Conn.; and National Steel and Shipbuilding (NASSCO) in San Diego. Bath builds destroyers, EB builds nuclear submarines and NASSCO is engaged in the construction of large auxiliary ships for the Navy and a series of commercial tankers.

Two competitors are teamed with smaller shipyards in building prototype Littoral Combat Ships (LCS) for the Navy: Lockheed Martin’s ships at Marinette Marine in Marinette, Wis.; and General Dynamics ships at Austal USA in Mobile, Ala., in partnership with Bath Iron Works.

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The new destroyers