The U.S. Navy christened its newest amphibious transport dock, the future USS Fort Lauderdale
(LPD 28), during a ceremony at the Huntington Ingalls Industries (HII) Ingalls Division
shipyard in Pascagoula, Mississippi.
The Fort Lauderdale is the 12th San Antonio-class ship.
It is the first ship to be named for the city of Fort Lauderdale, Florida.
Viewers may note that the San Antonio class is a class of amphibious transport docks, 0:00:49.579,1193:02:47.295 also called a Landing Platform Dock (LPD).
to the U.S Navy?
Let's get into the details.
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Ingalls Shipbuilding launched the future USS Fort Lauderdale (LPD 28) in April 2020.
USS Fort Lauderdale will be capable of transporting U.S. Marines, amphibious vehicles, conventional
landing craft, and rotary aircraft.
This means it has the capabilities to support amphibious assault, special operations, or
expeditionary warfare missions.
USS Fort Lauderdale would provide a high-quality command and control capability and improved
interoperability between U.S forces and partners in the region.
The San Antonio class was designed to provide the U.S Navy and U.S. Marine Corps with a
modern, sea-based platform that is networked, survivable, and built to operate with 21st-century
transformational platforms, such as the MV-22 Osprey.
The San Antonio class has significant survivability features and the class was designed to minimize
radar signature which makes it hard to detect & track.
The class has a hardened structure so that it can absorb shocks and has improved nuclear
blast and fragmentation protection.
USS Fort Lauderdale like other vessels of this class is fitted with the integrated Ship
Self-Defense System (SSDS).
The system fuses the radars and other sensors and controls the weapons systems for an automated
fast reaction capability against air threats.
The Advanced Enclosed Mast/Sensors (AEM/S) System mast, a 93-foot-high octagonal structure
35 feet in diameter, is constructed of a multi-layer frequency-selective composite material.
It is designed to permit the ship's own sensor frequencies with very low loss while reflecting
other frequencies.
The tapered octagonal shape of the AEM/S is designed to reduce the radar cross-section,
and enclosing the antennas provides improved performance and greatly reduces maintenance
costs.
USS Fort Lauderdale possesses multiple weapons for self-defense.
It is equipped with two Bushmaster II 30 mm close-in-guns.
The gun has a rate of fire of 200 rounds per minute and an effective range of 3.1 miles
or 5 km.
It has two Rolling Airframe Missile launchers.
RIM-116 Rolling Airframe Missile (RAM) is a small, lightweight, infrared homing surface-to-air
missile.
It has an operational range of 9 km (5.6 mi) There are two Mk 41 eight-cell VLS for quad-packed
ESSMs.
RIM-162 Evolved SeaSparrow Missile (ESSM) is used to protect ships from attacking missiles
and aircraft.
It has a range of 31 miles or 50 km.
Several twin M2 Browning machine gun turrets are also present.
Osprey will be a key component of the warship.
USS Fort Lauderdale would be launch or land up to two MV-22 Osprey simultaneously and
can accommodate 4 MV-22s on the flight deck and one in the hangar deck.
The Osprey is an American multi-mission, tiltrotor military aircraft with both vertical takeoff
and landing (VTOL), and short takeoff and landing (STOL) capabilities.
It is designed to combine the functionality of a conventional helicopter with the long-range,
high-speed cruise performance of a turboprop aircraft.
It was designed after the failure of Operation Eagle Claw during the Iran hostage crisis
in 1980 which underlined the requirement for a new long-range, high-speed, vertical-takeoff
aircraft.
For takeoff and landing, it typically operates as a helicopter with the nacelles add in vertical
and rotors add in horizontal add position.
Once airborne, the nacelles rotate forward 90° in as little as 12 seconds for horizontal
flight, converting the Osprey to a more fuel-efficient, higher-speed turboprop aircraft.
STOL rolling-takeoff and landing capability is achieved by having the nacelles tilted
forward up to 45°.
It has an operational range is 1265 miles or 2037 km.
The Osprey can be armed with one 7.62×51mm NATO M240 machine gun or .50 in caliber M2
machine gun.
It has a maximum speed of 509 km/h or 316 mph at sea level and 565 km/h or 351 mph at
15,000 ft.
Osprey can accommodate 24 troops (seated) and 32 troops (floor loaded).
So, V-22 Osprey could be used to carry special ops personnel.
Apart from the general capabilities, the ability of the USS Fort Lauderdale to deploy special
forces adds another important dimension.
Special forces operatives can take on many different types of missions including intelligence
gathering, which could be used as a base to plan for a tactical undertaking.
It remains to be seen how USS Fort Lauderdale where it will be deployed and exactly what
missions it will be tasked with.
But there is no doubt, the addition of USS Fort Lauderdale will definitely add a tactical
edge.