New warship is 'quantum leap forward' for the Navy (Visiting Americans 'Shaken and Shocked')

news.telegraph ^ | 2 February 2006 | Thomas Harding

[Cornpone]

The most powerful frontline warship since the Second World War was launched by the Countess of Wessex yesterday, marking a resurgence of British naval ship building.

The first of Britain's new Type 45 destroyers took to the waters of the Clyde as the world's most advanced air defence ship.

Daring will be able to track and destroy a target the size of a cricket ball travelling at more than three times the speed of sound, a "quantum leap forward in the Navy's capabilities", according the Royal Navy.

The boat's defensive system, combining a hugely powerful radar and missile system, has left American visitors to the yard "shaken and shocked", according to BAE Systems, its builders.

The destroyer's launch was watched by a crowd of 11,000 and hundreds of Daring's Glaswegian shipbuilders.

In the next 10 years, as many as eight T45s could be built at a cost of £650 million each. Also to be commissioned are two large aircraft carriers (£3.5 billion), four Astute class hunter killer submarines (£3 billion) and a fleet of up to 14 auxiliary ships (£3.5 billion).

Daring will be fitted with its radar and missile systems before its sea trials in early 2007. Its Samson radar, from its current location in Portsmouth, can monitor all take offs and landings from every major European airport.

[Woodman]

I think you're talking about this
Mobile / Tactical High Energy Laser (M-THEL) Program

[R. Scott]

Boeing Bird of Prey //-70 // 0.0000001

High bandwidth

Low bandwidth

[Steve Van Doorn]

what kind of plane is that thing? fighter attack what?

[Non-Sequitur]

Take the four of them out of mothballs, put in nuclear power plants, equip with Aegis (or most modern equivqlent). replace one turret with missle launchers, order brand new ammo for the main batteries and line the sides with phalanx guns.

If you're going to do that it's cheaper to start from scratch.

[johnny7]

That pyramid-thingy reminds me of the pagoda-like structures on the Jap battleships.

[Junior]

That is one ugly boat. Looks like someone was playing Ogre when he came up with the design...

[Pan_Yans Wife]

British Navy ping

[Oztrich Boy]

That is one ugly boat.

I think it looks better than some

Murricans can never get the idea that the superstructure should look as if it was designed to match and blend with the hull < cough Perry /cough>

[R. Scott]

what kind of plane is that thing? fighter attack what?

Right now – or a least all that is being said – it is a “a subsonic, single-seat technology demonstrator”. Once the technology is proven I can assume it can be a fighter with a ground attack role.

[Flightdeck]

It's always funny when someone uses "quantum leap" to mean a large change, when it actually means the smallest possible change.

[ASA Vet]

Oh stop introducing reality into their nostalgia.

[ironwoodchuck]

>Not quite -- Sunburn will penetrate 40" of armored steel.

I have a hard time buying that. If that were the case it would pass straight through any normal ship without doing much harm.

[Joe Miner]

Americans 'Shaken and Shocked'

Shocked? OMG they didn't? A Lucas electrical system?

[Bender2]

Re: Yeah, well they can say these things because the only thing that has kept them from military defeats over almost one hundred years is the finest military ever fielded by the greatest nation in the history of mankind.

The Israeli army is protecting Britain?

Brofholdonow was actually refering to the Texas Navy...

[ken5050]

I was astonished to learn that we no longer have the industrial capacity to manufacture the steel in the necessary thickness for the armor belt of the battleships..

[Junior]

'cept your picture was of the Arleigh Burke, not a Perry-class at all...

[Ken H]

from what I ahve seen of the very high cask strengths of rum casks stored in cooler climates, this daily allowance could have been 75% alcohol (150 US proof).

Geez. In my younger, dumber days, I drank a half pint of Bacardi's 151 in a night of partying. Put me in lala land. The hangover was enough to put me off rum forever.

On another occasion, I tried one swallow of Everclear, which immediately came back up. It never even made it to my stomach. My drinking nowadays consists of an occasional cold beer!

[Oztrich Boy]

'cept your picture was of the Arleigh Burke, not a Perry-class at all...

I knew that. I was using the Perry as the archtype of the "warehouse on ship hull" design school.

But I miss the days when the general layout of a ship could identify the nation who built it. Today they look alike

(South Korea, Great Britain, United States, Spain, China, Netherlands, Germany, India)

[jpsb]

The Royal Navy is back? Great news.