Posted on 03/04/2013 1:38:49 PM PST by blam
The Navy's Next-Generation Warship Gets Two Critical Defensive Boosts
Robert Johnson
March 4, 2013, 8:06 AM
The Navy's new $440-million Littoral Combat Ship needs some help taking care of itself. The LCS is said to be vulnerable to incoming strikes, meaning it might not survive a shootout with, say, China.
Thankfully the ship may get two new life-saving escorts.
First, DARPA wants to boost the Independence-class LCS drone capability to host a 27-foot wingspan Predator-like UAV. Previously it could only launch and receive a modest tactical drone like the ScanEagle. The new TERN program calls for a drone that can be ship-launched and recovered, while also carrying a 600-pound payload up to a 900-mile radius from the ship.
Second, the LCS is getting a new robotic surface-based mine hunter called the Unmanned Influence Sweep System.
All the LCS needs now is a sub-hunting guide to help it avoid another underwater threat, and it just so happens DARAPA's lining one of those up as well. The ACTUV sub-tracking drone is taking shape at SAIC, but no word yet on where it will be assigned once it's ready for deployment.
Click here to tour the Independence Class LCS.
(Excerpt) Read more at businessinsider.com ...
-Roll Tide-
That ship looks cool. Purpose built.
Does look cool. While I like the idea of the modular packages, I’d be somewhat skeptical that the needed module would be available - and instantly installed - at the precise moment it’s needed.
Kind of like asking a burglar to wait while you retrieve your gun from the safe, load it, remove the trigger lock prior to drawing down on them.
Not even close to the cruisers of my day.
It may look cook but I wouldn’t want to serve on one. That class of ship has close to zero survivability. A drone will do little to change that.
The only reason the Navy has those ships is so they can say they have ships, when in reality, they are very limited in what they can do, and where they can do them.
I’d rather have 3 destroyers than 10 LCS’s.
That thing looks badass.
Want...for my personal yacht.
I’d sail it through Somalia.
BTW, why is there always water pouring out of ports on boats?
I would think they are sealed preventing the ship from taking on water.
But it looks like you can play basketball on the deck of one of these bad boys.
At least destroyers at one time could lay down decent gunfire support. They would often come in close to the coast on RVN and shell with the 5" batteries.
Dunno just what "combat" this LCS is capable of.
Just out of curiosity, since the article specifically mentions China, how well do the Predator drones survive against actual military anti aircraft fire and not just a pack of Jihadis with AKs?
Too Small to stand up to bigger ships, too large to be a deterrent to the smaller ones, yet still not big enough for long endurance missions.
U.S. Navy FAIL!!!
I would like some more opinions
I see the vision of a virtual ship consisting of a redundant array of wide spread modules constructing a robust system.
At a minimum, Thermodynamics requires heat rejection.
Then there is the whole poop deck issue.
This is so sad . . .
These are some of the worst “combat” platforms ever made for the USN.
Fragile.
Hideously expensive.
Toothless.
“Littoral” which means stylish and trendy.
Worthless against any modern naval or air power.
Worthless when operating with a carrier group.
Worthless when operating with an amphibious group.
When the true history of these toy boats is revealed there will be graft, corruption, malfeasance, and idiocy discovered.
A total waste of American money. Which also serves to help further emasculate our navy.
Mostly, that's cooling water.
Ships are not allowed to discharge any waste, even water, anywhere near a port. See here.
Here's the largest fine from that list:
$18 million ($9 million fine and $9 million in court-ordered community service to fund environmental projects in South Florida)
What dictionary are you using?
Of or on a shore, especially a seashore: a littoral property; the littoral biogeographic zone.
n.
1. A coastal region; a shore.
2. The region or zone between the limits of high and low tides.
Means landing craft to me.
auxiliary cooling water systems
The ship(the whole class) is a HUGE boondoggle, it has major design issues and very bad electrolysis problems. What’s more, it doesn’t even carry an engineering crew capable of even minor repairs. The Navy doesn’t want to admit it bought a lemon
this thing is a waste of money, especially if it’s suppose to go inshore (which is what littoral means). it wouldn’t survive one kamikaze attack like the DDs off okinawa.
“Dunno just what “combat” this LCS is capable of.”
I’m thinking sailing up the rivers of the US, deploying troops to put down the coming revolution.
Freepers is the smawtest peoples and the most knowledgablest on the planet.
Wire at the Hotel...
It looks nothing like the Independence I was stationed on.
Admirals Yacht....
having served on board a nuclear submarine for a number of years....
It's even got a garage to park the limos!
The danger to this ship is skimmer missiles, the aluminum hull crushes like a beer can instead of a soup can. The robotic fly and swim toys are nothing but highly expensive bells and whistles. Not going to do much good to launch a drone if there is no place to land it when it runs out of fuel.
More stupidity by the Goobermint, put these government political designers on these boats and they will end up armored like the cars they drive. But when its only sailors, then heck, build them out of aluminum.
I suggest putting a deposit on them like a soda can for recycling, cause your going to need to.
http://www.naval-technology.com/projects/littoral/
Better get used to seeing these since it looks like the Navy has already ordered a dozen and plans on 50+. The project history is interesting to say the least.
Nothing worse than a hairy warship.
Build 25 Zumwalts.
Load them with nuclear tipped cruise missles and nuclear ASW.
Put in the directed energy weapons that they are wired for.
Sea control - guaranteed.
50 Littoral Casualty Ships?
Unusable. No value against the Chicoms.
If you had ANY idea how much the corrosion problems on this platform have already cost us taxpayers, you wouldn’t be laughing about it
What it actually needs are some much, much better anti-surface missiles (ASMs) with range enough to defeat the other littoral corvette sized ships it is apt to face who will be carrying between four and eitght such missiles themselves.
In the atni-surface role and mission pack, the NLOS missile (whose range was shorter than our adversaries) has been cancelled and now they are making due with the Griffin missile that have less than a ten mile range.
Either they should bolt tywo dual or quad cannister Harpoon launchers to these vessels, or supply them with a 16 cell Mk-41 VLS, which they are both designed to carry, and put at least eight of the new ASM Tiomoahwks in there with the rest being ESSM anti-air missiles.
That is where these ships are the weakest, and while the things DARPA is proposing are neat...they will not save it in an engagement with another modern corvette sized vessel in the littoral spaces.
Right now the various modules aren’t even in existence, let alone available and able to be swapped out in any of time frame.
The whole Little Crappy Ship program is a overpriced disaster.
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