Bristling With New Gear, USS Pinckney Joins Pacific Fleet

‘Dual-Beaming,’ Robotic Minehunter Top Changes to Arleigh Burke-Class Warship

By ROBERT M. BYRON and MICHAEL R. GOOD

On May 29, a powerful new surface combatant will be commissioned and join the U.S. Pacific Fleet. It is outfitted with new radar designed to detect and track deadly sea-skimming missiles in cluttered, near-shore environments. It also will carry the first integrated unmanned surface vehicle of its kind in the surface Navy. And its cutting-edge combat system will harness the horsepower of commercial computer processors.

When it sailed from Northrop Grumman Ship Systems shipyard in Pascagoula, Miss., for homeport in San Diego, USS Pinckney was the 41st ship in the long, proud line of the Arleigh Burke class. Haze gray with familiar topside lines, the Pinckney looks strikingly similar to other Arleigh Burkes on the outside, but buried inside its steel skin are powerful new technologies that were not even in development, or, in some cases, even contemplated, when Aegis ships joined the fight in Desert Storm. The Pinckney will debut new systems and capabilities that will keep the class the envy of every navy in the world.

Bred to meet the global threat posed by the Soviet Navy during the Cold War, the versatile ships of the Arleigh Burke class have found plenty of full-time work since Desert Storm — shooting Tomahawks to halt ethnic warfare in the Balkans, enforcing international sanctions on the high seas and tracking ballistic missiles fired into Kuwait by Iraqi forces.

From the outset of the program — and long before the latest wave of acquisition reform — the Navy made the Arleigh Burke program a flagship for innovation and evolutionary acquisition strategy. This approach has enabled the class to adapt its initial design to one that today incorporates new lessons and technology for 21st-century warfare.

The Pinckney joins the fleet during a time of military transformation. Adaptation to changing conditions has long been one of the defining characteristics of Aegis-class ships. The Pinckney opens a new littoral capability chapter for the family of Ticonderoga-class cruisers and Arleigh Burke-class destroyers, a family of ships with a history of unmatched air-defense capabilities. Today, and in the foreseeable future, the military’s challenge is not a symmetric matchup between Cold War superpowers; it is from rogue factions with asymmetric forces who can operate beyond the parameters of conventional warfare and in their own familiar “backyard.”

The Navy today must be ready to surge to any hot spot with organic, or self-contained, capability and operate in coastal areas with complex geographies; geographies that can hide shore-launched cruise missiles, quiet diesel submarines and sea mines.

Like its predecessors, the Pinckney still will be able to use its powerful radar and battery of missiles to knock down hostile aircraft and sea-skimming antiship missiles. But it also will be able to detect and track fast-moving targets at low altitude in the shadow of a coastline. And rather than sit and wait for dedicated minesweepers and hunters to arrive on scene, the Pinckney can use an unmanned vehicle to clandestinely find mines.

Pinckney’s two major new features — the SPY-1D(V) radar and the Remote Minehunting System (RMS) — will bring measurable operational advantages to new and age-old threats it may face. Other, less obvious, changes — such as commercial-off-the-shelf (COTS) hardware and open-architecture software improvements for its combat systems — will improve its critical capabilities today, as well as save the amount of time and money it takes to maintain them in the long term.

The new SPY-1D(V) is designed to spot low-flying, low-radar cross section, high-speed threats in severe clutter and against sophisticated countermeasures. One of the most significant improvements is in the computer program. For example, “dual-beaming” is a new feature that nearly doubles the rate at which sailors can search the combat air space; it involves two opposing array faces simultaneously sending out and processing pulses. Previous generations of SPY-1 radars could only transmit from one array face at a time.

It is no secret that unmanned systems have become important new additions to the modern battlefield, no matter whether it’s in the air, on land or at sea. The RMS is the Navy’s new integrated shipboard unmanned vehicle that can hunt and identify mines at great distance — even beyond the horizon — from the ship.

Carried aboard the ship in a specially configured starboard aft section, RMS — a diesel-powered, semi-submersible — can prowl beyond the ship’s horizon, autonomously scouting and searching for mines using its forward- and side-scanning sonars. Its onboard Global Positioning System (GPS) navigation system takes commands via a data link from the ship. Sonar data and streaming video from the vehicle’s mast-mounted camera are continuously transmitted to the ship.

In addition to introducing technology, the Pinckney advances the new standard for updating old systems with state-of-the-market commercial components and easily modified software, instead of computers based on military specifications and standards. Doing so helps cut the cost of maintaining systems while reaping the benefits of newer, more powerful processors, displays and programming standards.

The Pinckney is the first Arleigh Burke-class destroyer outfitted with the latest version of the Aegis Weapon System, Baseline 7 Phase I, which is based solely on commercial processors. All of Pinckney’s computers use standardized commercial multiprocessors. Pinckney also is the first of the class to have a comprehensive computing network architecture based on COTS technology, which increases ship systems’ capability and is a major step toward open architecture.

The ship’s antisubmarine warfare system, the AN/SQQ-89(V)15, also has undergone a dramatic upgrade in the continued evolution toward the use of an open system architecture fully based on COTS technology. The (V)15 retains all the tactical functionality present in its predecessor, but has a considerably simpler physical architecture and substantial growth capability. It also provides new functionality for automatic active sonar detection and tracking, mine reconnaissance, and range dependent acoustic performance predictions.

There also are a number of discrete improvements on the Pinckney that will have a discernable effect on the ship’s capability. One is the implementation of a system that distributes navigational and GPS data to Aegis and the gun weapon system and provides digital chart display functionality to the combat information center and chart house/bridge. The Navigation Sensor System Interface Block IV is Pinckney’s — and the Navy’s — conduit to paperless navigation.

Another is the ingenious combination of technology and good sense that uses a ferrite-cored current probe wrapped around the upper part of the ship’s mast that turns the entire mast into a high-frequency antenna. Called the Mast Clamp Current Probe Antenna, it has no moving parts and is virtually maintenance-free. The new antenna will replace all of the maintenance-intensive tilt-whip HF receive antennas used on DDG 51-class destroyers and almost every surface ship in the fleet.

While the Navy’s mission is unchanged, the way it achieves it continues to evolve. Whether maintaining peace or projecting power, the Pinckney is well prepared to answer any call — in blue water, the littoral or anywhere in between. The ship combines state-of-the-art technology with existing naval capabilities and is today the most technologically advanced destroyer in the world. Ultimately, the Pinckney is emblematic of the Navy’s proud traditions and its confident future.

At its christening in June 2002, Sen. Thad Cochran, R-Miss., said, “Ships like Pinckney will allow our nation and our sailors to continue to do the work in fighting for freedom, ensuring that fear and terror will never prevail against liberty and freedom. … The U.S. Navy is second to none in sea power and in the capability and know-how to preserve freedom and project power for defeating terrorism and protecting the citizens of the United States.” Sailors aboard the Pinckney can, indeed, be “proud to serve.”

The Pinckney will be commissioned in Port Hueneme, Calif., on May 29, and be ready for operations in the spring of 2005.

Cmdr. Robert M. Byron is the commanding officer of USS Pinckney. Cmdr. Michael R. Good is the destroyer shipbuilding production manager for Program Executive Officer, Ships, in the office of the assistant secretary of the Navy for Research, Development and Acquisition.

Lt. David N. Black of the USS Pinckney and Adam S. Owings of L-3 Communications Government Services Inc., contributed to this article.