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H*a*r*r*o*l*d

On 4/19/2014 5:41 PM, F*O*A*D wrote:
On 4/19/14, 5:33 PM, wrote:
On Sat, 19 Apr 2014 16:52:44 -0400, F*O*A*D wrote:

On 4/19/14, 4:45 PM, Mr. Luddite wrote:
On 4/19/2014 4:32 PM, F*O*A*D wrote:
On 4/19/14, 3:47 PM, Mr. Luddite wrote:
On 4/19/2014 2:25 PM, F*O*A*D wrote:

A $3 billion ship...with IPS drives. It ought to be good for a few
laughs in the future.

"The ship took about three years to complete and was perhaps the most
advanced warship of its time."

Oh, that's not the USS Zumwalt. It's the USS Princeton,
commissioned in
1843 and the first US Naval ship to be driven by a propeller
instead of
sails or paddlewheels.

And they call me Mr. Luddite.

The Zumwalt looks as if it would roll over in heavy beam seas, but I'm
sure the design was tank-tested for that. I read that the "tumblehome"
design is supposed to minimize it's radar footprint, but really, a
ship
two thirds the length of a New Jersey class WWII battleship is
going to
be pretty easy to spot at sea, from the air, or from a satellite.

You forget. Oceans are big. A 600+' ship is a speck from the air or
space unless you know exactly where to look for it. It is said that
the radar signature of the Zumwalt is about that of a small sailboat.

Hi-res satellite photos aren't going to mistake a 600' target for a
small sailboat.

As with most of our adventures lately, we are only trying to fight 3d
world countries who have RADARs about as sophisticated as the one on
Wayne's trawler.
They do still have access to French Exocets or the Chinese and Soviet
equivalent tho so they can be a threat.

Some of those countries have "friends" who would be delighted to share
intel with their client states. And if we are only trying to fight "3rd
world countries," why do we need a high-tech, 600-foot destroyer?

The ship stinks of technological arrogance. It'll probably run aground
on a reef a few hundred yards offshore. All hands will be saved but this
USS Albatross will sink like a stone.
Like a low transom Pahkah?