LCS Is 'Revolutionary Step' for U.S. Navy

By Peter Atkinson, Deputy Editor

From an operator's perspective, driving the U.S. Navy's first Littoral Combat Ship (LCS) is “a dream come true,” Cmdr. Michael Doran, commander of the LCS 1 Gold Crew, told a briefing audience at the Sea-Air-Space (SAS) Exposition May 6. “The ship is very sporty.”

The Lockheed Martin-designed USS Freedom, which was commissioned late last year, paid a week-long visit to Alexandria, Va., just across the Potomac River from the expo site at National Harbor, Md., to be a part of SAS. It played host to media and attendee visits, and was open for tours by the public the weekend after the SAS closed.

“I grew up on frigates, destroyers and cruisers. Being able to drive a ship and go 45 knots is something not many people get a chance to do,” Doran said.

However, he added, there was much more to the ship “than just going fast. This whole program is a revolutionary step for the U.S. Navy. It's completely different than anything we've done before, not just in the design ... not just the fact that we have water-jets on board, that we have no propellers or rudders; the fact that we have gone down to an optimal manning concept – I have 40 people on my core crews on a ship that is roughly the size of a frigate. It's all that plus changing the way that the Navy does things through its policies, through its instructions, through its regulations; saying that the way that we do those things for the ships that we have in the Navy today won't work for my ship, so we have to change it.

“So it's very exciting not only driving fast, but being part of something that is really revolutionary in changing the scope for the whole Navy.”

LCS program officials also presented a “state of the program” report during the brief, and highlighted the interchangeable mission packages aimed at bringing unprecedented flexibility and adaptability to the class of ships.

The second LCS, the General Dynamics-designed Independence, is wrapping up construction at Austal USA's Mobile, Ala., facility with sea trials expected this summer in anticipation of delivery in the fall, according to Capt. John Neagley, LCS assistant program manager.

Noting the radically different designs of the two vessels – Lockheed's version features a semi-planing monohull, General Dynamics' is an all-aluminum trimaran – Neagley said, “It's important to recognize that both of these ships meet the capabilities of the Navy. They just approach this in slightly different ways.”

After cost overruns and delays prompted former Secretary of the Navy Donald Winter to cancel the third and fourth LCSs a year ago, the program is getting back on track. Two more LCSs, Fort Worth and Coronado, are under order and three are being sought in the 2010 defense spending request.

Though not directly referring to the program's earlier problems, Neagley did note that, "For a shipbuilding program, we've moved very, very quickly. From concept design in '02 to delivering a ship, a ship in the water, in the hands of the fleet, in about six years, for a shipbuilding program that really is unprecedented."

Michael R. Good, program manager for Littoral Combat Ship Mission Modules, addressed the ship's three mission packages for mine countermeasures, surface warfare and anti-submarine warfare, describing them as “a great capability for our Navy.”

One of each of the mission modules has been delivered to the Navy, and a second mine countermeasures package will be delivered later this fiscal year. The Navy has been testing several unmanned aerial and surface vehicle technologies as part of the mine countermeasures module.

“One of our primary objectives is to take Sailors out of the mine field,” Good said. “Today in order to sweep a minefield, you have 84 sailors on ... a minesweeping ship and they've got to go right along the edge, and sometimes into, the minefield to do their mission. One of the ideas with LCS is to employ unmanned technology to take the sailor out of that danger zone.”