U.S. Navy Will Commission Guided-Missile Destroyer USS Delbert D. Black Sept. 26 at Port Canaveral

Arleigh Burke class built around the Aegis Combat System and the SPY-1D multifunction passive electronically scanned array radar

BREVARD COUNTY • PORT CANAVERAL, FLORIDA – The U.S. Navy will commission the newest Arleigh Burke-class guided-missile destroyer, USS Delbert D. Black (DDG 119), on Saturday, Sept. 26 at Port Canaveral.

This commissioning is a U.S. Navy event and will be a small, socially-distanced gathering in accordance with the Governor’s guidelines.

The USS Delbert D. Black is named in honor of Master Chief Petty Officer Delbert Black, the first Master Chief Petty Officer of the Navy, who died in 2000.

He is remembered for establishing the role of the Navy’s senior enlisted leader and the ship naming is the culmination of a decade of advocacy by MCPONs to honor him with a combatant ship.

The 9,200 ton USS Delbert D. Black is 510 feet long, with a draft of 33 feet and was launched on September 8, 2017. On March 29, 2019, the ship was damaged at the shipyard when a heavy-lift ship collided with a barge that was alongside the Delbert D. Black.

The barge in turn struck the destroyer, resulting in several workers sustaining minor injuries and causing significant damage to the destroyer. The superstructure and hull were both breached and substantial internal spaces were flooded.

On March 12, 2020, the ship successfully completed acceptance trials, after spending two days at sea in the Gulf of Mexico.

The Arleigh Burke class is a U.S. Navy destroyer built around the Aegis Combat System and the SPY-1D multifunction passive electronically scanned array radar. The class is named for Admiral Arleigh Burke, an American destroyer officer in World War II and later Chief of Naval Operations.

Following commissioning, the ship will be homeported in Mayport, Florida with sister ships USS The Sullivans, USS Lassen, USS Farragut, USS Thomas Hudner and USS Paul Ignatius.

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