December 12, 2015 — The Navy’s new stealth destroyer endured a real life-and-death test Saturday when crew members aboard the future USS Zumwalt helped rescue a Maine fisherman suffering a medical emergency at sea.

The Zumwalt, a 600-foot-long guided missile destroyer built at Bath Iron Works, was conducting sea trials early Saturday morning when the U.S. Coast Guard requested assistance from any boats in the vicinity of the fishing vessel Danny Boy, located about 40 nautical miles southeast of Portland at 3 a.m. The captain of the Portland-based Danny Boy, 46-year-old Dale Sparrow, was experiencing chest pains, but a Coast Guard helicopter crew determined it was too dangerous to try to hoist the captain because of the 45-foot boat’s deck configuration.

The Zumwalt responded to the scene and launched an 11-meter “rigid hull inflatable boat” – the type used by Navy SEALs and other special forces – to bring Sparrow on board the destroyer.

“After medical evaluation, the patient was transferred from Zumwalt to a Coast Guard helicopter and then to an area hospital,” a Navy spokeswoman, Capt. Thurraya Kent, said in a statement Saturday night. The Coast Guard said Sparrow was flown to Portland International Jetport and then taken to Maine Medical Center.

Read the full story at Portland Press Herald