Navy's latest littoral combat ship joins Naval Station Mayport

JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — Naval Station Mayport welcomed its 21st ship Wednesday morning, USS Billings.

This ship was named after Billings, Montana. It has been on the water for about two months and was commissioned in Key West, Florida over the weekend.

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"It's a littoral combat ship, it's fast and agile," USS Billings Commanding Officer Nathan Rowan said. "We do inshore operations, multi-mission package which includes surface warfare, mine countermeasure and surface warfare."

The crew is a unique factor to this ship.

It involves two alternating crews, gold and blue.

The blue crew brought it into Naval Station Mayport.

In about eight months, it will switch out with the gold crew.

In all, they said there are about 150 sailors assigned to this ship.

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"It's shallow draft and the speed," Rowan said. "It's one of the fastest ships in the Navy and how we can get close to shore is something that's not normal for any other war ship."

Sailors said this ship can perform surface and mine warfare unlike most littoral combat ships.

It can travel beyond 48 knots, which is faster than most combat ships, and has more weaponry than the average littoral combat ship.

"The things we can do working with other forces," Rowan said. "These ships are a little different than mine countermeasures ships due to the fact we have a little bit more weapons on board than they do."

Rowan said the crew is still getting familiar with the ship and performing tests. No deployments are scheduled at this time.

Cox Media Group