USS Cooperstown Launched and Christened

The U.S. Navy launched its newest Freedom-variant littoral combat ship (LCS), the future USS Cooperstown (LCS 23), on January 19 and then christened the new warship during a ceremony on February 29, in Marinette, Wis.

"The christening of the future USS Cooperstown marks an important step toward this great ship's entry into the fleet," said Acting Secretary of the Navy Thomas Modly. “The dedication and skilled work of everyone involved in the building of this ship has ensured that it will represent the great city of Cooperstown and serve our Navy and Marine Corps team for decades to come."

Built by a team of Lockheed Martin and Fincantieri Marinette Marine, LCS 23 is the 12th Freedom-variant LCS, the 23rd in the class. She is the first ship named in honor of Cooperstown, N.Y.

LCS is a modular, reconfigurable ship, designed to meet validated fleet requirements for surface warfare (SUW), anti-submarine warfare (ASW) and mine countermeasures (MCM) missions in the littoral region. Using an open architecture design, modular weapons, sensor systems and a variety of manned and unmanned vehicles to gain, sustain and exploit littoral maritime supremacy, LCS provides the U.S. joint force access to critical areas in multiple theaters.

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 in Marinette, Wis., (for the odd-numbered hulls). The Independence-variant team is led by Austal USA in Mobile, Ala., (for LCS 6 and the subsequent even-numbered hulls).