US Destroyer Passes Rough Seas Testing

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The US Navy’s new stealth destroyer Zumwalt passed a round of sea trials in which it sailed through two storms off California and Alaska, moving it into the next phase of testing, set to take place this month.

The US Naval Sea Systems Command said that engineers from the Naval Surface Warfare Centers carried out tests by the end of 2020 on Zumwalt as part of the ship’s Performance and Special Trials, which are conducted on the lead ship of every class to test how the ship behaves in various sea conditions.

The ship held its own through the high end of Sea State 6, which means 20-foot seas, according to a Naval Sea Systems Command press release, with ship and crew performing at acceptable levels according to the parameters of the test.

The motion of the ship is different from previous classes of ship, but it handles heavy seas better than other ships. Capt. Andrew Carlson said: “You definitely have to get used to the roll, which is very short compared to other ships…”

The next step will be a scale-model replica of Zumwalt that will repeat similar conditions in what’s known as the Navy’s “indoor ocean” — a massive pool in Maryland, that holds more than 12 million gallons of water and mimics real wave patterns.