Pearl Harbor is new ship's port

By Susan Roth
Advertiser Washington Bureau

WASHINGTON — The Navy has designated Pearl Harbor as the home port for a new guided-missile destroyer, scheduled to come to Hawai'i in May 2003.

Sen. Daniel Akaka, D-Hawai'i and a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, announced yesterday that the $1 billion Arleigh Burke Class destroyer named for his friend, the late Sen. John Chafee, R-R.I., would be sent to Pearl Harbor after it is commissioned at the Bath Iron Works in Maine.

Hawai'i's economy should benefit from about 300 new personnel with about $14.7 million in salaries and an estimated 115 new families, according to the Navy. The Chafee will employ 21 officers and 280 enlisted personnel.

The multi-mission ship is equipped with the Navy's latest AEGIS combat-weapons system, which combines communications, radar and weapons technologies. Ships of the Arleigh Burke class, which includes the USS Cole that was attacked in Yemen in 2000, are 505 feet long, can move at speeds of more than 30 knots and displace 8,850 tons.

The Chafee will carry standard surface-to-air missiles; Tomahawk cruise missiles that can be launched from vertical launching systems; two automated, radar-controlled weapons systems for close-in attacks; Harpoon anti-ship missiles; two torpedo launchers; one five-inch gun; and electronic warfare systems.

Akaka welcomes the Chafee to the state, said his spokesman, Paul Cardus. "It's good news for Hawai'i. John Chafee was a great senator, a great Marine and a great American."

Chafee, a moderate Republican known for his leadership on environmental issues, served in the Senate for 23 years. He died at age 77 in October 1999, near the end of his fourth term in office.