BALTIMORE (AP) – What’s a ride like in the Navy’s largest and most sophisticated new destroyer? Capt. James Kirk compares it to “a really souped-up sport utility vehicle.”
“It’s not like a Ferrari, but it’s like a very big SUV that is made to go very fast,” says Kirk, commanding officer of the futuristic USS Zumwalt that’s being commissioned Saturday in Baltimore.
With a price tag of at least $4.4 billion, the guided missile destroyer is perhaps more like a stealthy Rolls-Royce. The company manufactured the ship’s propellers and generator sets. The Zumwalt also features an unconventional wave-piercing hull.
“Very smooth,” is how Lt. Cmdr. Nate Chase described the ride. “You had no fear of having an open cup of coffee and getting jerked around, like some of these other ships.”
Here are some other details about the Zumwalt: