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.

[RetiredSWO]

Kinetic energy and blast -breaks them in half
Like the Styx missile it is designed to pop-up
on terminal and dive through the ship

[RetiredSWO]

Hey - I love the mighty battleships too but they are not invincible.
I served on both Wisconsin & Missouri w/ DESRON 22 during
Desert Storm and we were holding our breath when Seersuckers
was launched at Missouri (luckily they both missed).

[ironwoodchuck]

Somebody would have to convince me there was such a thing as a missile made to go through 40" of armorplate. The Iowa class ships were made to do battle with Terpitz and Musashi and Yamato and to survive hits from 18" guns. It just isn't obvious that there's any way to make a missile with the destructive power of a shell from one of Yamato's guns.

Other than that, there is 900' of room for phalanx guns on either side of an Iowa ship.

[Osage Orange]

I always enjoyed being the ship when playing Monopoly.

[Osage Orange]

No it doesn't. It looks like a civil war ironclad that's been absorbed by the Borg.

Resistance is futile.....

[RetiredSWO]

Think about it - 750# warhead traveling @ Mach 2.
BTW -- CIWS rounds out of rounds very quickly.

[ironwoodchuck]

I'd guess that a shell from one of Musashi's or Yamato's guns would be about 3000 lbs travelling at about 2700 fps.

The Iowa class ships were made to survive that.

[ironwoodchuck]

BTW, if phalanx guns aren't enough to protect an Iowa ship, there's 900' of room for metalstorm on either side of an Iowa class ship as well.

[RetiredSWO]

2700fps at muzzle -- drag comes into play very quickly.
Not exactly a very smooth surface on any of those rounds.

[RetiredSWO]

Take off the 5"/38's and install RAMS in conjunction with CIWS.
Those guns are obsolete with respect to range now.
The ERGM round in a 5"/62 exceeds 40NM.

[CodeToad]

Mach 3 missile ping.

[ironwoodchuck]

There's one other big consideration which nobody is talking about. Someday believe it or not, we might have to take some island again and the idea of that Aegis destroyer with that 5" yuppie gun on its bow taking the place of all the battleships and LSRs which used to cover island invasions has to be one of the world's biggest jokes.

[Billthedrill]

It does look like a Dalek. We gotta git us a Tardis.

[McGavin999]

Britania rules the waves. Good for the Brits!

[RetiredSWO]

That yuppie 5" gun has put more steel on target than any other naval cannon. New rounds are actual smart enough to distinguish our tanks from enemy armor and when they find them they put an exotic metal 9" molten rod through the top. Secondary explosions from the tank's own rounds will kill it.

Besides the biggest cannon on land is only 155mm with a lower muzzle velocity (350fps). The only reason the next generation is going to 155mm vice 5" (127mm at 2500fps) is to share rounds with the Army and USMC (everything is Joint OPS now).

I loved the battleships and briefly served on them -- but their day has passed and over-the-horizon attacks rule the day. WWII Marines didn't have Whiskey Cobras and Harriers right over their shoulders. I wish we had more guns but Bush 41's plan to decommission destroyers as new ones were built was accelerated by Clinton without replacing the gun mounts lost. We lost 286 gun mounts in 91-93 (including the 16") and have only replaced about a dozen.

The biggest advantage of the battleships was they scared the hell out of anyone thinking about messing with them. Their retirement was the loss of a big psychological advantage -- but the Tomahawk missile is damn near as scary.

The battleships carried only 16 Tomahawks, Tycos carry 122 (about the number of 16" rounds/magazine), Burkes 90, and the remaining Sprains pack 61. The converted "Virginia-class" SSGNs will carry 154 Tactical Tomahawks.

I would like to see a big-gun ship again but they cost about $2 billion/year to operate in 1991. What would be the cost now? Plus you would have to start up a plant just to build the rounds and manufacture the powder. Just not very feasible.

[FostersExport]

“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.”

I recall that the rum actually served a useful military purpose in days of yore. The British sailors were so well trained that they could perform their duties whilst way more than three sheets to the wind. So before a battle the sailors would get roaring drunk and come the battle itself they paid less attention to the limbs flying about and carried on firing.

Also, regarding the hard-sounding names of British ships. The Navy went through a phase of naming ships after counties and cities, but the sailors got fed up and wanted their manly ship names back! HMS Liverpool or HMS Warspite – what would you rather have?!

[Theophilus]

Yep, Britannia rules the waves!

[Jimmy Valentine's brother]

Would like to see how she handles in force five seas. That's a lot of moment sticking up in the air.

[Jim Noble]

I've read all the arguments, and I'm no expert - but if I was going to force the Straits of Hormuz, I'd want to take a few Iowa-class BBs with me.

[rahbert]