USN to Commission LCS Detroit

The Navy will commission its newest Freedom-variant littoral combat ship, Detroit (LCS 7), during an 11 a.m. EDT ceremony Saturday, Oct. 22 on Detroit's waterfront.

Detroit is the sixth U.S. ship in our nation's history to be named in honor of city of Detroit.

Adm. Phil Davidson, commander, U.S. Fleet Forces Command, will deliver the ceremony's principal address. Barbara Levin, wife of former U.S. Senator Carl Levin, serves as the ship's sponsor. In a time-honored Navy tradition, she will give the order to "man our ship and bring her to life!"

"This ship represents so much. It represents the city of Detroit, the motor city. It represents the highly-skilled American workers of our nation's industrial base, the men and women who built this great warship and it represents the American spirit of hard work, patriotism and perseverance," said the Honorable Ray Mabus, secretary of the Navy. "The USS Detroit will carry these values around the world for decades to come as the newest ship in our nation's growing fleet."

The first USS Detroit was a British sloop of war captured by the U.S. Navy during the War of 1812. The screw sloop of war Canandaigua was renamed Detroit for a brief time in 1869, but returned to her original name that year. A turn of the century cruiser served for nearly 15 years. In 1923, another cruiser was commissioned and served throughout World War II, earning six battle stars. The most recent ship named Detroit was a fast combat support ship that served from 1969 to 2005.

USS Detroit is a fast, agile, focused-mission platform designed for operation in near-shore environments yet capable of open-ocean operation. It is designed to defeat asymmetric "anti-access" threats such as mines, quiet diesel submarines and fast surface craft.

The LCS class consists of two variants, the Freedom variant and the Independence variant, designed and built by two industry teams. The Freedom variant team is led by Lockheed Martin (for the odd-numbered hulls, e.g. LCS 1). The Independence variant team is led by Austal USA (for LCS 6 and the subsequent even-numbered hulls).

Each LCS seaframe will be outfitted with a single mission package made up of mission modules containing warfighting systems and support equipment. A dedicated ship crew will combine with aviation assets to deploy manned and unmanned vehicles and sensors in support of mine countermeasures, anti-submarine warfare or surface warfare missions.