LCS Independence - the ship from the future

three thousand tons of weapons and technology packed in three hulls in a single ship at first glance it seems like a ship from star wars splashed down off the american coast but this is not so this is perhaps one of the future most mass-produced ships of the us navy and it is a trimmeran but what is it a formidable weapon capable of meeting the challenges of the future or just something futuristic for pretentious military demonstrations in the 1990s the u.s navy found itself at a crossroads the cold war ended and the powerful soviet fleet which it was supposed to fight all this time fell apart a large group of serious ocean-going ships was left without a goal the fleet suddenly found itself in a situation where its main enemy was small opponents such as pirates and smugglers on nimble ships in coastal zone american cruisers and destroyers were too large and expensive for such work while remaining vulnerable in the face of opposition from many small enemy ships arleigh burke against a boat with a rocket looks weird initially it was proposed to solve this problem by creating the dd21 cruisers technologically advanced stealth ships capable of performing a wide range of tasks more efficiently through the use of missiles as well as advanced artillery but from the very beginning it was clear that these ships would be very expensive and the navy would not be able to afford a sufficient number of them it was necessary to create simpler cheaper and lighter ships something comparable in size and weight to corvettes and that was the task the shipbuilders took up naturally in the process of development of the program for the creation of literal combat ships or in short lcs these ships became more complex larger and more expensive new tasks weapons and equipment appeared they had to be able to cross the ocean sail very fast fight submarines and mines conduct reconnaissance transport troops and accommodate aviation complexes primarily helicopters the cost of the program was also added by the fact that the differences and prospects of the concepts were so serious that it was decided to make two types of ships at once one of these ships is the freedom class created by a consortium of lockheed martin fincantieri and marinette marine corporations for our time it looks like quite a regular ship angular shapes a gun on the front deck a helipad the ship we're talking about today is the second member of the lcs program but unlike freedom the ship cannot be called regular at all the independence class literal combat ships are the product of another consortium of companies general dynamics and hostel in the case of this ship questions arise at the first glance independence is a tremoran a trimaran is a vessel with three hulls located parallel to each other and connected at the top of course trimarans have their own advantages and disadvantages they are more stable in sailing allowed to make a larger deck they are more difficult to sink while such a structure thanks to special hydrodynamics allows to decently increase the speed of the disadvantages it can be pointed out that such ships require a much greater structural strength since while sailing on the waves a serious load is created in the beams between the hulls and of course the economy it is more difficult to build a trimaran than an ordinary ship especially if we're talking about a rather large ship although trimmer ants were invented a long time ago they became popular in the early 2000s with the birth of both small sports sailing ships as well as yachts and various transport vehicles the military has also been working with them for a long time one of the first modern military trimarans was the test ship of the royal navy of great britain triton which however became a floating lap and was not adopted to service in the united states ships with several hulls were also quite active although preference was given to catamarans such as the fsf-1c fighter in the civilian sector the australian company austal has distinguished itself its pride became the 126 meter 413 feet benchigue express trimmer and ferry capable of sailing at speeds of up to 36 knots and now serving in the canary islands the ship turned out to be very technologically advanced and its concept became interesting to the american military just a reminder one of the creators of the independence class is precisely austol so ben chijigua express in a sense is its older brother in 2004 as part of the tender for the creation of future lcs ships lockheed martin and general dynamics received a preliminary order for several prototypes both companies and their partners had to assemble two ships after which the military had to choose one of them for a large contract for 55 ships in 2005 freedom was laid down and in 2006 respectively independence at the austral usa docks in mobile alabama it's like a special area for foreign companies just a few miles from the ducks of the australian hostel is the plant of the european airbus as it often happens the construction of the lead ship of a new class end with such a complex design was not without a serious cost overrun by the time it was put into service the independence had spent 700 million dollars although it was planned to be 220. to be fair it should be noted that the rest of the ships that followed were already much closer to the planned figure and so ships of the independence class are made up of three hulls located in parallel the main one in the center and two small ones on the sides which are called out-trigger hulls this is the reason for the unusual appearance most of the ship hangs in the air sliding over the water as if on skates the requirement for the reduction in radar visibility also adds to the weird look an angular design with a minimum of protruding parts most of all this is noticeable in the bowel which resembles a huge beak the ships are quite large they are 127 meters or 418 feet long and have a displacement of about 3 100 tons for example the hourly berk class destroyer is 155 meters 509 feet long not much more with almost three times the displacement one of the important conditions of the fleet when ordering these ships was their high speed the trim around scheme makes it possible to achieve excellent performance of 44 knots 81 kilometers per hour with reduced fuel consumption in comparison with conventional ships of this type at the same time the greater resilience of the trimaran scheme allowed to make it lighter the ship for the most part is made of aluminum not steel although it will be easier to break through such a hull the range is appropriate 4 300 nautical miles almost 8 000 kilometers the requirement of the military for the ability to cross the ocean is fulfilled another advantage of the ship was the rather large deck in the aft section and the interior space below it the compartments with a volume of 11 000 cubit meters are designed to accommodate a large amount of various equipment depending on the mission including weapons and vehicles up to armored personnel carriers like humvee or icb striker for loading and unloading as well as work at sea this compartment is equipped with several large hatches the main one being in the stern due to the large area of the deck stretching over three hulls the aircraft carrier capabilities of the ship are wider than that of similar vessels the ship has a landing pad that can operate several aircraft at once and the hangar can accommodate a pair of sh-60 seahawk helicopters or several drones such as the m28c scout the ship's power plant is a complex system at first glance even too complex after all we're not talking about an aircraft carrier or a heavy cruiser its core is a pair of gas turbine generators with a capacity of more than 45 000 horsepower each plus a group of diesel generators for the main and auxiliary functions which together give power to four water jet propulsion units located at the stern of the central hull the independence like a number of other newest military vessels being created in our time has the highest level of automation of all onboard functions the open architecture control complex created by general dynamics itself includes both automation of functions and interfaces gathered around the ship primarily of course on the bridge thanks to these solutions a rather large warship is supported by a crew of only 43 sailors the system turned out to be successful and it was also integrated into another exotic ship the spearhead class transport catamaran another brainchild of austal usa of course the most important thing on the warship is weaponry it is rather modest here in comparison with what we are used to seeing on larger ships but considering the tasks it is quite worthy the role of a classic club on the ship was given to the 57 millimeters mach 110 cannon from bae systems in the turret located in the bow of the ship the cannon is a simple cheap and crude tool more formidable for opponents of medium severity will be the missile arsenal of the lcs the ships are equipped with blocks of eight nsm missile launchers created by norwegian kongsberg defense and airspace an anti-ship missile is capable of hitting targets at a distance of up to 100 miles 185 kilometers at a speed of mach 0.95 not the most intimidating option but quite decent by the way the boeing rgam 84 harpoon and lockheed martin lrazm missiles also claimed this position but the job remained with nsm in addition to it as a main course another set of launchers for 24 agm-114l missiles the good old hellfire not a bad way to deal with small ships and boats as well as if necessary clear the coastal zone of enemy forces raytheon's cram complex is responsible for protecting the ship this is a kind of hybrid a platform and a location complex from the famous vulcan phalanx anti-aircraft gun but instead of a six-barreled cannon there is a launcher for rim-116 air defense missiles it wasn't possible to work without cannons at all so the ship was equipped with several 50 caliber machine guns and a pair of 30 millimeter mark 44 bushmaster 2 chain guns a good argument in dealing with small boats that were smart enough to get close to the ship the description of the armament complex can be inspiring and loud of course but it may still not impress many viewers the main calibers here are a small cannon in the nose and a group of light missiles originally created to combat tanks these weapons can hardly be called formidable against fairly serious opponents in high intensity conflicts the answer to this claim is first and foremost goal setting the lcs ships are closer to corvettes in class they are needed to protect the coastal zones as well as to deal with small targets like drug dealers and pirates no one is going to throw it into the ring against russian cruisers at the same time it should be noted that one of the main functions of the ship is the modularity of many systems with the possibility of replacing equipment depending on the assigned tasks so the listed weapons are in a sense basic by default if necessary other systems cargo devices and weapons can be placed here first of all a variety of drones including air and underwater ones such as the mq8 and north of turn the us navy initially ordered two independence class ships the independence lcs ii and its brother coronado lcs4 the project quickly created the impression of itself as quite promising and by 2010 it was decided to order 10 more ships and then this contract was expanded by the way the same thing is happening with the freedom class from lockheed martin apparently the military decided not to put all eggs in one basket and to support both ships in parallel by 2020 the lcs independence project includes 19 ships of which three ships are still awaiting their turn five are under construction and testing and eleven ships are in service of which the first two prototypes are planned to be sent to the reserve in the coming years the lcs program continues to evolve and is becoming one of the driving forces of innovation in 21st century shipbuilding we will be watching subscribe to the channel so as not to miss new videos there's still a lot of interesting things on the horizon you

Channel: Horizon

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Keywords: lcs, lcs independence, uss independence, uss coronado, littoral combat ship, littoral ship, Independence class, independence ship, independence vessel, navy, lcs coronado

Id: 330nm4WKtG8

Length: 13min 28sec (808 seconds)

Published: Wed Dec 02 2020