The Navy and General Dynamics Bath Iron Works hosted a christening ceremony for the future USS Louis H. Wilson Jr. (DDG-126) on Sept 27, the company’s first Arleigh Burke-class Flight III destroyer. The Flight III variant is designed to accommodate the ANSPY-6(V)1 Air and Missile Defense Radar. (Photo: General Dynamics)

The Defense Department on Monday said it has certified that General Dynamics’ [GD] Bath Iron Works (BIW) as ready to support construction of a second guided-missile destroyer (DDG) at a time. DoD said this follows a “comprehensive, multi-phase due diligence review” that found the shipyard has achieved significant operational and managerial improvements that have led to the capacity and stability improvements that mean it can support additional simultaneous Arleigh Burke-class destroyer orders. The Pentagon said its review evaluated “production throughput,…