ROCS Kee Lung

ROCS Kee Lung (基隆; DDG-1801) is the lead ship of her class of guided-missile destroyers currently in active service of Republic of China Navy.

Kee Lung in 2007
History
Taiwan
Builder	Litton Ingalls, Pascagoula, Mississippi
Laid down	12 February 1979
Launched	1 March 1980 as USS Scott (DDG-995)
Acquired	30 May 2003
Name	ROCS Kee Lung (DDG-1801)
Namesake	Keelung
Commissioned	17 December 2005
Status	in active service
General characteristics
Class & type	Kee Lung-class destroyer
Displacement	Light: 6,950 t (6,840 long tons; 7,660 short tons) Full: 9,574 t (9,423 long tons; 10,554 short tons) Dead Weight: 2,624 t (2,583 long tons; 2,892 short tons)
Length	171.6 m (563 ft)
Beam	16.8 m (55 ft)
Draft	10.1 m (33.1 ft)
Propulsion	4 × General Electric LM2500-30 gas turbines, 80,000 shp total (60 MW)
Speed	33 knots (61 km/h)
Sensors & processing systems	SPS-48E air search radar SPS-49(V)5 air search radar SPG-60 gun fire control radar SPS-55 surface search radar 2 × SPG-51D Missile Control Radar SPQ-9A gun fire control radar SPS-64 Navigation Radar SQS-53 hull-mounted sonar
Electronic warfare & decoys	AN/SLQ-32(V)3 OUTBOARD II EW Suite Mark 36 SRBOC AN/SLQ-25 Nixie towed sonar decoy
Armament	2 × Mark 26 launchers with 68 × SM-2 Block IIIA SAM 1 × Mark 141 quad launcher with 4 × RGM-84 Harpoon 2 × Mark 45 5 in (127 mm) gun 2 × Mark 15 20 mm Phalanx CIWS 4 × 12.7mm MGs 2 × Mark 32 triple tube mounts with 6 × Mark 46 torpedoes
Aircraft carried	2 × Sikorsky S-70C(M)1/2 Seahawk

History

While Kee Lung is the lead ship of her class, she was actually not the first ship in her class built. Kee Lung was formerly the American Kidd-class destroyer USS Scott (DDG-995), which was decommissioned by the United States Navy in 1998. Scott was sold to the Republic of China Navy along with the other three Kidd-class destroyers in 2001. Scott was then renamed to Kee Long was the first of the four ships to be commissioned in the Republic of China Navy which made her the lead ship in the Republic of China Navy. Ironically, the USS Kidd (DDG-993), which was the original lead ship of the class, was also sold to the Republic of China Navy in 2006 and was renamed ROCS Tso Ying (DDG-1803). For a period of time Kee Lung was tentatively named Chi Teh (紀德), a transliteration of Kidd into Chinese. But it was later decided to name her after the port of Keelung, a major naval port in northern Taiwan.

Kee Lung, along with her three sister ships, is the largest destroyer and second largest ship in displacement ever in Republic of China Navy service, only smaller than ROCS Hsu Hai (LSD-193), a dock landing ship. Kee Lung was re-fitted for service in the ROCN at Detyen's Shipyard in North Charleston, South Carolina. She was formally commissioned on 17 December 2005 along with sister ship ROCS Su Ao (DDG-1802).

ROCS Keelung (DDG-1801) shadows PLANS Shandong (CV-17) in the Philippine Sea.

In May 2022, during the Han Kuang Exercise "Joint Intercept Operation Live-Fire Exercise", President Tsai Ing-wen specially boarded the Keelung ship to go out to sea to supervise the "actual combat" exercises from emergency port departure, anti-mine warfare, fleet air defense, joint sea and air anti-submarine warfare, anti-surface warfare and air control operations, and combined the three armed forces and the coast guard to use firepower to block the enemy's invasion. ^[1]

On September 13, 2023, the Ministry of National Defense released footage of the ship monitoring the Chinese aircraft carrier Shandong.^[2]

On May 23, 2024, the ship monitored the PLA's 052C Xi'an conducting the "Joint Sword 2024A" exercise.^[3]

Specifications

Kee Lung is the only one of her sister ships to be equipped with LAMPS III system and flight deck strengthened. This enables Kee Lung to carry up to two of the more capable Sikorsky S-70(M)-1/2 Seahawk helicopters for anti-submarine warfare, compared to her sister ships.