The U.S. Navy's Aegis program, of which LASSEN is the newest ship, is one of the most important shipbuilding programs in America today. Truly multimission combatants, Aegis ships are designed to provide primary protection for the Navy's battle forces, but are also the most balanced surface warships ever built, equipped with the weapons, electronics, helicopter support facilities, and propulsion, auxiliary and survivability systems to carry out the U.S. Navy's missions today, and into the next century.
DDG 82 is 509.5 feet long, with a beam of 66 feet. Four gas turbine engines will power the 9,238-ton ship to speeds in excess of 30 knots. Construction of the ship began on September 8, 1997, and DDG 82's keel was laid on August 24, 1998. DDG 82 and her crew of approximately 340 officers, chiefs and sailors.
DDG 82's Aegis Combat System, the world's foremost naval weapons system, includes the AN/SPY-1D phased array radar; the MK 41 Vertical Launching System (VLS), which fires a combination of up to 90 Standard surface-to-air, Tomahawk surface-to-surface and VLA antisubmarine rockets; and the AN/SQQ-89 Antisubmarine Warfare System, with a bow-mounted AN/SQS-53C sonar and AN/SQR-19 towed array. LASSEN will have eight Harpoon antiship missile launchers and six MK 32 torpedo tubes, as well as two MK 15 Phalanx Close-In Weapon Systems and a five-inch, rapid-firing deck gun.
The ship’s aircraft handling and support facilities include dual aircraft hangars (port & starboard), a dual Recovery Assist, Securing and Traversing (RAST) System, and associated machinery systems providing significantly enhanced helicopter launch and recovery, command and control, and maintenance/repair capabilities. DDG 82 features the over-the-horizon LAMPS MK III Antisubmarine Warfare Control System, and will be assigned two SH-60B Seahawk Undersea Warfare Helicopters. State-of-the-art C4I (Command, Control, Communications, Computers and Intelligence) systems provide Aegis destroyers and their crews with total situational awareness.
The potent offensive and defensive capabilities of Aegis destroyers are achieved with maximum survivability. Extensive topside armor is placed around vital combat systems and machinery spaces, and a wider hull significantly improves seakeeping ability. Acoustic, infrared and radar signatures have been reduced, and vital shipboard systems are hardened against electromagnetic pulse and over-pressure damage. A comprehensive Collective Protection System guards against nuclear, chemical and biological agents. State-of-the-art propulsion and damage control systems are managed by an all-new data multiplexing system.
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