Littoral Combat Ship Design
The LCS shall be configured with core systems and a Mission Package that will enable the ship to perform all core ship functions and at least one focused mission or inherent capability. A core system is a system that is resident in the LCS in all configurations with the purpose ofcarrying out core ship functions such as self-defense, navigation, and C41, or other capabilities common to all mission areas. To allow for spiral development, core systems may or may not be modular. A Mission Package is a functional grouping ofsystems that is integrated in LCS to give it the capability to execute a focused mission or inherent mission. The LCS shall have the capability to change out Mission Packages in order to shift missions.
The modular Mission Packages are a central feature of the LCS design and will provide the main war fighting capability and functionality for specific mission areas. A Mission Package may consist of a combination ofmodules, manned and unmanned off-board vehicles, deployable sensors, and mission manning detachments. The modules will be integrated in the ships' module stations or zones. The ship's module stations will have defined volumes, structures, and support service connections.
The LCS design must meet the critical performance parameter requirements for mission reconfigurability. The ship's open system architecture will affordably maximize lifecycle flexibility foruse of future systems upgrades and required mission systems change-out. This will facilitate the separate production and platform integration ofmodular mission systems. The major elements of the open systems architecture, module stations, functional element zones, standard interfaces, links, controls etc., will be designed to accommodate future Mission Packages, future ship flights, and technology refresh. Mission packages, to the greatest extent possible, should integrate into the Seaframe's core command and control architecture to minimize the use ofunique equipment.
The LCS will have hull structural strength and provisions for growth allowances and fatigue life in accordance with its expected service life. The ship will withstand extreme environmental conditions such as high sea state, wind and air/sea temperature. The ship will withstand impacts from tugs, piers, and other hazards typical to routine ship operations in navigable waters. Tankage volume shall reflect environmental as well as fluid management requirements. It will provide adequate static and dynamic stability to ensure safe and efficient ship operation and not degrade personnel performance.
The LCS will incorporate a total ship approach to survivability that addresses susceptibility, vulnerability, and recoverability, with crew survival as the primary objective. The principal means to be employed will be to minimize susceptibility through speed, agility, signature management and the core self-defense weapon suite. The LCS' capability to reduce vulnerability by absorbing a weapon impact and retain seaworthiness and weapons system capability will be commensurate with ship's size and hull displacement and will emphasize crew survival and automated damage control and firefighting applications. The LCS will meet the requirements for Level I in accordance with OPNAVINST 9070. 1. In addition to Level I requirements, the LCS will have the capability to:
- Similar to SMARTSHIP technologies, automate damage control actions to the most practical extent to support optimum manning level requirements to include automatic detection, location, classification and management offire, heat, toxic gases and flooding, structural damage and hull breaching throughout the ship using a ship's damage control management system.
- Economically maximize personnel protection, prevention ofship loss, and retention of self-defenses capability through the use offragmentation protection.
- Employ an appropriate level ofcollective protection against chemical, biological, and radiological threats.
- Deploy life rafts and other survival equipment in both intact and damaged conditions. Equipment must support 120% ofthe ship's maximum manning capacity.
- Incorporate signature management to deny and disrupt the enemy's detect-to-engage sequence to reduce the probability that the ship will be hit by a threat.
- Monitor and control own ship emissions (EMCON) and apply tactical signature control through rapid control ofelectronic, infrared, optical and acoustic signatures in anti-surveillance, anti-targeting, and self defense roles.
- Monitor own ship magnetic and acoustic signature to maximize ship survivability when operating in the vicinity ofa minefield.
- Employ signature management, hard kill and soft kill systems to counter and disrupt the threats detect-to-engage sequence in the littoral environment, and have networked capabilities to improve situational awareness to complement hard kill, soft kill and signature management systems.
- Have the capability to provide point defense against ASCMs and threat aircraft through the use of hard-kill and soft-kill systems, counter-targeting, speed, and maneuverability. LCS will be Link16 and CEC (receive only) capable. For Flight 0 LCS, the capabilities provided by CIWS Mk 15 Blk lB. RAM, and NULKA should be considered.
- Have the capability to operate in clear and severe natural and electronic countermeasures environments inherent in littoral operating areas.
- Have the capability to evaluate engagements against air targets.
The LCS will maneuver and maintain itself in all expected operational environments and situations with emphasis on the worldwide littoral operating environment. It will be self-deployable and operate with naval strike and expeditionary forces. The ship's draft will permit it to operate in the littoral. The LCS will:
- Provide the speed and endurance to deploy and operate with CSG, ESG, and LCS groups.
- Perform seamanship and navigation evolutions such as: formation steaming, precision navigation, precision anchoring, recover man overboard, handle small boats and off-board mission systems, launching and recovering small boats, maneuvering for torpedo evasion and for ASCM countermeasures employment.
- Perform deck evolutions such as: underway vertical and connected replenishment, recover man overboard, launch/recover off-board sensors and vehicles, handle small boats, tow orbe towed, and when necessary abandon ship.
- Provide a redundant and responsive ship control system that enables effective evasive maneuvering against torpedoes, ASCMs, mines and small boat attack.
- Support and conduct Search and Rescue (SAR) operations.
The LCS will conduct aviation operations with the following capabilities:
- Handling of organic, day/night, all weather manned rotary-wing and unmanned aviation assets to support the principal mission areas ofASW, MIW and SUW and operations such as, but not limited to SOF, SAR, CSAR, MTO, MEDEVAC, EW and logistics. Aviation operations will support the MH-60 family ofaircraft to include flight deck certification.
- The ships can carry out aircraft launch and recovery in conditions up to Sea State 5, i.e., in winds up to 27 knots and average wave heights between 6.4 feet and 9.6 feet.
- Class II facilities of NAEC-ENG-7576 to include electricity (400Hz), fresh water and fuel (landing, fueling, hangar, reconfigure, and rearm) for the MH-60 family of aircraft, and to conductjoint and interagency rotary wing capability (such as USCG helicopters, AH-58D AHIP or similar type helicopters), and employ and embark VTUAVs. LCS shall not have the capability to conduct Helicopter In-Flight Refueling (HIFR). It is envisioned that the LCS will embark MH-60 family of aircraft for limited durations. The material forrepairs and minimal organic maintenance to support these limited embarks should come onboard in a modular fashion and be tailored in size, and the air detachment should be optimally manned. Material support for MH-60 limited embarks shall not include Phased Maintenance.
- Control manned and unmanned aircraft, including the capability to provide safetyof- flight for the controlled aircraft.
- Aviation fire fighting capability should be automated to the maximum extent practicable.
- The program of record calls for three MQ-8B Fire Scouts to be stationed on LCS in place of one MH-60S helicopter. The MQ-8B will be deployed from the Littoral Combat Ship as a part of the anti-submarine and mine warfare mission modules.
The LCS will have the capability to support day and night operations with available air, surface and subsurface unmanned vehicle operations. These capabilities will include control, data-link, day/night launch and recover, refuel, hangar, maintain, and rearm. The LCS operations will support Mission Packages containing VTUAVs, USVs and UUVs. The LCS will also be capable of rapidly reconfiguring Unmanned Vehicles and their mission payloads, while the ship is underway. The ship must be capable oflaunch, recovery and control ofmultiple unmanned vehicles, and should use common launch/recovery and control systems to the maximum extent practicable.
The LCS must be capable ofemploying manned and unmanned systems such as RMS, LMRS, 1 im RHIB, SPARTAN, AH-58D, MH-60R/S and Fire Scout VTUAV, in support ofmeeting the focused mission requirements.
The LCS shall have a core C4 system that will support mission and ship systems tactical and non-tactical operations, including the capability to fully integrate into FORCEnet. The C4 system will conform to the Navy's Open Architecture program guidelines and standards, will be interoperable with embarked Mission Packages and joint forces, and integrate all sensors, communication systems, and weapon systems into a single C2 system. The LCS will:
- Provide a total ship and LCS squadron command and control capability that provides automation ofcommand and control functions, ship situational awareness, and decision-making.
- Provide for the capability to simultaneously coordinate and control multiple manned and unmanned systems in support ofLCS missions.
- Fuse organic data and non-organic data to maintain integrated tactical picture.
- Implement a Total Ship Computing Environment (TSCE), which includes processors, networks, storage devices and human system interfaces in support of core and modular mission capabilities that conforms to the Navy's Open Architecture (OA) Program guidelines and standards.
- Provide multiple levels ofsecurity as required by mission systems.
- Provide external communications capability to control and operate with embarked and off-board systems, communicate with theater sensor assets, operate with joint, allied, coalition and interagency forces, and use reach-back assets. The ship will have secure, reliable, automated, wide bandwidth, high data rate communications with ship based and shore based warfare component commanders.
- Be interoperable with standard Navy and Joint data networks including CEC, Joint Planning Network, Joint Data Network, Global Command and Control System - Maritime (GCCS-M), SIPRNET, NTPRNET and Global Information Grid.
- Provide for onboard processing and data storage capabilities to accommodate handling and use ofdata generated by off board sensors.
The flexibility of the LCS to perform many different missions, with a relatively small crew, makes this ship extremely attractive to the Navy. Staffed by a crew ranging in size from 15 to 50, the nucleus crew will be augmented by special mission crews that will embark on a mission-need basis. In total, the ship can berth approximately 75 people. Each ship will also have two crews, a blue crew and a gold crew. Each crew will have a commanding officer, executive officer and a command senior chief. Unlike most ships, the only two people aboard this type of ship who won’t stand a watch are the commanding officer and executive officer. The command senior chief will, in addition to his or her normal duties, stand watch as an officer of the deck (underway).
The LCS will have no extra personnel. There will be no wasteful duties and no sailor assigned will perform meaningless work. Every sailor counts. The two-crew concept has many merits. While one crew is at sea, the other will be ashore training. This rotation allows the ship to be deployed to a greater extent, maximizing the ship’s operational impact to the fleet, yet protecting the individual deployment tempo of the crew.
The LCS uses a training repertoire known as Train to Qualify (T2Q) that represents a completely different paradigm than traditional officer of the deck (OOD) training. Train to Qualify establishes as a baseline objective the intent to equip the prospective LCS OOD with the requisite mariner skill set and tactical awareness within the maritime environment required to proficiently handle the ship immediately upon reporting aboard. From an engineering perspective, students will depart the course with about 65 percent of their personal qualifications standards (PQS) completed.
The T2Q concept, which began at SWOS in July 2006, was new to the surface warfare community, but it has been used successfully by the Navy’s aviation community and civilian maritime industry for years. Just as with aircraft, where a small one- or two-man crew is required to operate high-cost, high-risk complex systems with no margin for error, the LCS demands a similar level of training for its OODs. On a traditional surface vessel, the OOD is backed by a bridge team consisting of redundant layers of highly skilled individuals focusing on specific parts of the overall picture. On the LCS, the OOD must be able to do it all, often in tight maneuverable quarters at speeds in excess of 40 knots.
This means the majority of prospective OODs will find the LCS to be quite different from most vessels they have served on before, most notably in the ship’s ability to travel at great speed and do so in water as shallow as 15 feet. These are huge assets for the Navy in the war on terror, but they require the OOD to maintain a level of vigilance and situational awareness well beyond that required of conventional vessels.
The LCS OOD curriculum was designed with two primary areas of focus: reinforcing the basic lessons that every OOD must understand and exploring, identifying and honing the skills that are critical to the officer operating in a high-speed environment. Tests are heavily weighted toward ‘Rules of the Road’ knowledge and understanding. The idea is to produce consistent, measurable, objective training outcomes for all students, which the student can immediately and directly apply to the real world.
The most vital tool in this T2Q curriculum is the simulator used at SWOS. Most shiphandling simulators used in the Navy and in commercial training facilities have a generic quality to them, which is somewhat unrealistic. The LCS simulator is unique in that it is approximately an 80 percent replication of the bridge of the LCS, including the placement of controls and seating positions, much like a flight simulator. This is the essence of the T2Q methodology because the simulator experience not only teaches the OOD how the LCS handles under any given condition, but it also teaches him or her “muscle memory.” Put another way, because of the fast-paced, littoral environment the OOD must operate in, he or she must know exactly where to reach without looking down, and the simulator teaches that.
These simulators are of the highest quality and provide realistic training that matches real world operations on a ship. As a result, the students leave the course highly trained and with a level of confidence that is usually not obtained until having spent a significant time on board their platform. By dedicating focused training time at SWOS, the path to qualification is not hindered by their other job demands at sea.
The simulator exercises begin with basic shiphandling in open water on a clear, calm day. The students then practice working around berths and slips with varying levels of wind and/or current. Training eventually progresses to the point where each two-person bridge team is routinely running the ship in restricted waters at top speed with multiple contacts in low visibility and/or at night.
The Littoral Combat Ship Wholeness Concept of Operations requires a crew to certify in 15 mission areas using its core crew and one additional mission area applicable to both the core crew and mission module personnel. Using a discrete event simulation tool called the Total Crew Model, a March 2007 Naval Postgraduate School study analyzed the proposed Fleet Response Training Plan for Littoral Combat Ship. This examination using a 14-day training cycle snapshot of the 40 proposed crew members was found to be sufficient to sustain the ship through a training assessment phase. The snapshot evaluated crew endurances using 63, 67 and 70-hour workweeks. The modeling showed the 70-hour workweek satisfied the manpower requirement workload, as delineated in OPNAVINST 1000.16J. This workweek, however, exceeded core crew endurances by 594 hours and 42% of the crew exceeded acceptable fatigue levels.
The LCS will provide sufficient berthing forthe simultaneous assignment of ship's company and mission detachments. Designs must use a human-centered design approach to automate decision processes and optimize manning. LCS designs should exploit SMARTSHIP technologies to the maximum extent practicable. Generic multi-modal reconfigurable work-stations and consoles will be used to the maximum extent practicable. Designs must also:
- Maintain the health and well being of the crew.
- Provide medical care to assigned and embarked personnel.
- Provide administrative and supply support for assigned and embarked personnel.
- Provide on demand individual and team training, with mission rehearsal capability, both in port and underway.
- Provide ship upkeep and maintenance.
- Provide physical security.
- Ensure safety to equipment, personnel and ordnance.
The LCS will operate throughout its life cycle in U.S., foreign, and international waters in full compliance with applicable Federal, state, local foreign and international pollution control laws and regulations. Environmental constraints include minimization/mitigation ofdischarges and emissions.
