Amphib Arlington to be christened Saturday - Navy News | News from Afghanistan & Iraq - Navy Times

Amphib Arlington to be christened Saturday

The third in a series of Navy amphibious vessels named in honor of the victims of the 9/11 terrorist attacks will be christened Saturday, and a key responder at the Pentagon nearly a decade ago is bringing the heroics of his fellow emergency workers with him.

The future USS Arlington is being built at the Northrop Grumman Corp. shipyard in Pascagoula. It’s named in honor of Arlington County, Va., where American Airlines Flight 77 crashed into the Pentagon on Sept. 11, 2001, killing 184 people, after being hijacked en route from Washington-Dulles International Airport to Los Angeles.

The ship’s sponsor is Joyce Rumsfeld, wife of former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, who was in the Pentagon on the day of the attack.

Arlington County Fire Chief James Schwartz will be the keynote speaker at the ceremony. He was assistant fire chief and incident commander at the time of the attack, coordinating the rescue response efforts at the Pentagon. Although more than nine years have passed since that horrible day, he said he thinks almost daily about all the responders from Washington-area agencies.

“Although the ship is being named in honor of the victims and responders, we feel strongly it is for the families of the people who lost their lives that day,” Schwartz said.

The Arlington, the eighth ship in the San Antonio amphibious transport dock class, is 684 feet long and serviced by a crew of 350 sailors. It can carry up to 800 Marines into assault operations and has a flight deck that can handle helicopters and the MV-22 Osprey tilt-rotor aircraft. The Navy has designated the motto: “Strength, Honor, Fortitude” for the Arlington.

Other ships in the assault vessel series named in honor of Sept. 11 include the amphibious transport dock New York, which is now in service and the amphibious transport dock Somerset, named for the Pennsylvania county where United Airlines Flight 93 went down, killing all 40 passengers and crew members. The Somerset is being built at the Northrop Grumman shipyard at Avondale, La. Construction costs for each ship run around $1.2 billion.

Schwartz said the Arlington will bring together military members and civilian responders “who are focused on the same kind of mission: the security of our communities.” At the same time, it will point out a geographical fact overlooked by many — that the Pentagon is in Virginia and not Washington, D.C., he said.

“We have developed amazing relationships with the people in that building,” Schwartz said. “Maybe this will be an opportunity for people to recognize our county and the people who protect it.”

Saturday’s ceremony stands to be the last major shipbuilding event before Northrop Grumman spins off its struggling shipbuilding division into a separate company known as Huntington Ingalls Industries Inc., which will take ownership of the Pascagoula and Avondale yards, as well as the Northrop Grumman yard at Newport News, Va. Avondale is scheduled to be closed in 2013 after work is completed on the Somerset and another in the LPD-17 series of amphibious assault vessels.

Northrop Grumman stockholders will receive one share of the shipping business for every six shares of Northrop Grumman stock they hold on March 30. Shares of the shipbuilding business will begin trading the next day.