Navy to christen next-generation warship
The Navy will on Saturday christen the first of its next-generation warships, the $4 billion USS Zumwalt, built at Bath Iron Works.
The Bangor Daily News reported the high-tech ship, measuring 610 feet long and weighing 15,760 tons, will include new radar and weapons systems and has the capability to engage in surface, shallow water and air warfare.
The ship is the first of three in the DDG-1000 or Zumwalt class to be built at Bath Iron Works through 2020. The construction program for that class was curtailed in 2008 to three ships based on escalating cost estimates, but defense industry analyst Loren Thompson told the newspaper the Navy may find the ship is cheaper to operate over its lifetime than other destroyers. The Zumwalt requires a crew of 130, around half that required by the Arleigh Burke class of destroyers it was supposed to replace.
Thompson said he expects the Navy will revisit the ship’s cost and whether the program should have been curtailed after the USS Zumwalt joins the fleet.
The christening is scheduled to take place Saturday at 11 a.m. at the shipyard in Bath.
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