Frag Out! Magazine
Issue link: https://fragout.uberflip.com/i/693549
Presence of this vessel in that particular part of Europe is because of a patrol rotation which task is to show a flag and to present capabilities of the ship. It was the first individual visit of US Navy vessel in Polish harbors since last year's May. The is an Arleigh Burke class destroyer was ordered in 1993 and entered service in 1998. It comes from an early batch that lacks a hel- icopter hangar on deck and due to it, as it comes to helicopters, its capabilities are lim- ited to refueling and rearming them on deck. Since the first half of the 2014 a homeport for "Donald Cook" is Spanish Rota – it is a result of modernization that allows to elimi- nate ballistic missiles and also an agreement between European NATO members and USA in the terms of providing a protecting sphere over the Old Continent. It is worth mentioning that modernization made to eliminate ballis- tic missiles did not limited other capabilities of the destroyer. According to the rules in the US Navy that are the same from many years, ship was not available for visitors. Only a group of journal- ists had a chance to look at it from the inside. The hero of the events on the Red Sea from 2014 (when for the first time crew was a witness of low fly-bys of SU-24) was in the media's interests – officers that was asked about events from that period said it wasn't unusual and occurred nearly every day. Visiting of the ship included mostly opened foredeck and afterdeck (where the 127mm cannon is placed on the foredeck, verti- cal missile launchers, anti-vessel RGM-84 Harpoon missile launchers, Phalanx artillery self-defense systems and a helipad). Visiting the ship allowed, again, to show changes in the philosophy of using ships by Americans - firstly: decoy beacons launchers were in- stalled (in the amidships), on the sides of the of the captain's bridge non-lethal, acoustic defense system, LRAD, was installed. In the incoming months there will be also changes in the deck armament – afterdeck Phalanx system will be replaced by SeaRAM launch- er. All four destroyers staying in Rota are sup- posed to be the first who are going to receive mentioned system (first shooting tests were held on USS "Porter" which has it already in- stalled). Of course, chosen rooms inside the vessels were able to visit too – crew mess and ward- room, captain's bridge and combat informa- tion center. Traditionally, journalists weren't allowed to take any pictures inside the last one. NAVAL FORCES