This post has been updated to correct the start of the USS Zumwalt (DDG-1000) availability and correct the hull number of USS Michael Monsoor (DDG-1001).
The three Zumwalt-class destroyers could face delays in fielding the first hypersonic weapons in the U.S. Navy surface fleet, according to a Thursday report from the Government Accountability Office’s annual weapons report.
The Navy planned to add launch tubes to USS Zumwalt (DDG-1000) during an availability at HII’s Ingalls Shipbuilding in Pascagoula, Miss., starting this year for completion by 2025. The following two ships in the $29 billion class – USS Michael Monsoor (DDG-1001) and Lyndon B. Johnson (DDG-1002) – will get the CPS tube installation in their own modernization periods.
The space now occupied by the 16,000-ton destroyer’s twin 155 mm advanced gun systems will get replaced with four 87-inch tubes for about a dozen Common Hypersonic Glide Bodies (C-HGB) – the joint round developed for the Army and Navy. The weapons are part of the Pentagon’s Conventional Prompt Strike capability, or the ability to hit a land target at long ranges with little to no notice.
However, that schedule could get hampered by testing of the Conventional Prompt Strike systems on at-sea platforms, the program told the GAO. The delays in fielding the CPS on Zumwalt in 2025 and the integration of the CPS come from both testing a maritime version of the C-HGB and the tight schedule to integrate the weapon into the hull of the three-ship Zumwalt-class.
