BAE San Diego awarded $19.9 million for PSA of first Flight III DDG

The future USS Jack H. Lucas (DDG 125), set to join the active fleet on October 7, will be the Navy’s first Flight III destroyer. [U.S. Navy photograph]

NAVSEA has awarded BAE Systems San Diego Ship Repair Inc., San Diego, Calif., a $19,962,606 cost-plus-award-fee modification to exercise an option in a previously awarded contract for the accomplishment of a post shakedown availability (PSA) as well as procurement of additional materials in support of the PSA. The work will be performed in San Diego, California, and is expected to be completed by October 2024.

The PSA is for one Arleigh Burke class guided missile destroyer: DDG 125. Delivered by Ingalls Shipbuilding on June 27, DDG 125 is the future USS Jack H. Lucas. Set to join the active fleet on October 7, with a commissioning ceremony in Tampa, Fla., DDG 125 will be the Navy’s first Flight III destroyer with notable technological upgrades, centered on the AN/SPY-6(V)1 Air and Missile Defense Radar and incorporating upgrades to the electrical power and cooling capacity.

Guided-missile destroyers provide multi-mission offensive and defensive capabilities. Destroyers can operate independently or as part of carrier strike groups, surface action groups, and expeditionary strike groups. They are capable of conducting anti-air warfare (AAW), anti-submarine warfare (ASW), and anti-surface warfare (ASuW).

DDG 125 is named for Pfc. Jack Lucas, who served in the U.S. Marines during World War II, earning the Medal of Honor for his heroism at Iwo Jima, when he was just 17 years old. He is the youngest Marine, and the youngest serviceman in World War II, to be awarded the United States’ highest military decoration for valor. In 1961, he returned to military service as a captain in the U.S. Army and trained younger troops headed for Vietnam. Lucas passed away on June 5, 2008 in Hattiesburg, Mississippi.