The U.S. Navy and General Dynamics’ Electric Boat are close to finishing specifications and designs for the country’s next-generation ballistic nuclear submarine, the Ohio Replacement Program, or ORP.
The Ohio Replacement Program team is poised this year to finish up a 600-page ship specification document detailing designs and plans for the submarine, Navy and Electric Boat officials said.
“This spring, the Ohio Replacement Program will finalize the remaining few of the 161 Ship Specifications. These specifications establish the requirements the numerous ship systems must adhere to in order to meet defined warfighting requirements,” Capt.William Brougham, ORP program manager told Military.com in a written statement.
Slated to enter service in 2031 and serve through 2085, ORP, a so-called SSBN, is scheduled to begin construction by 2021. Requirements work, technical specifications and early prototyping are already underway at Electric Boat locations in New London, Ct. and Quonset Point, R.I.
Consisting of three volumes, each with hundreds of pages, the ship specification documents are designed to detail the configurations, designs and technical requirements for the boat, said Brian Wilson, ORP director, Electric Boat.
“We are very much in the technology and getting the requirements set phase. We’ll finish the ship specs this year, multi-volume documents that tell you everything about how you’re going to manage the design,” said Wilson.
The ship-specifications detail the systems, technologies and electronics as well as crew plans, design intentions and overall integration, Navy officials said.
Designed to be 560-feet– long and house 12 Trident II D5 missiles fired from 44-foot-long missile tubes, ORP will be engineered as a stealthy, high-tech nuclear deterrent able to quietly patrol the global undersea domain.
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Down deeper is that the UK's Royal Navy is buying parts for their replacement program so they will be in common with the ORP SSBN.
They will carry 16 missiles not 12.
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