Many of the ship's features were originally developed under the DD21 program ("21st Century Destroyer"). In 2001, Congress cut the DD-21 program by half as part of the SC21 program. To save it, the acquisition program was renamed as DD(X) and heavily reworked. The initial funding allocation for DDG-1000 was included in the National Defense Authorization Act of 2007. By February 2008, a $1.4 billion contract had been awarded to Bath Iron Works in Bath, Maine, and full rate production officially began a year later, on 11 February 2009. In July 2008, a construction timetable was set for General Dynamics to deliver the ship in April 2013, with a March 2015 target date for "Zumwalt" to meet her initial operating capability but, by 2012 the planned completion and delivery of the vessel was delayed to the 2014 fiscal year. The first section of the ship was laid down on the slipway at Bath Iron Works on 17 November 2011, by which point, fabrication of the ship was over 60% complete. The naming ceremony was planned for 19 October 2013, but was canceled due to the United States federal government shutdown of 2013. The vessel was launched on 29 October 2013. In January 2014, "Zumwalt" began to prepare for heavy weather trials, to see how the ship and her instrumentation react to high winds, stormy seas, and adverse weather conditions. The ship's new wave-piercing inverted bow and tumblehome hull configuration reduce her radar cross-section. Tests involved lateral and vertical accelerations and pitch and roll. Later tests included fuel on-loading, data center tests, propulsion events, X-band radar evaluations, and mission systems activation to finalize integration of electronics. These all culminated in builders' trials and acceptance trials, with delivery for US Navy tests in late 2014, and with initial operating capability (IOC) to be reached by 2016. "Zumwalt"s first commanding officer was Captain James A. Kirk. Kirk attracted some media attention when he was first named the captain, due to the similarity of his name to that of the "Star Trek" television character Captain James T. Kirk, played by William Shatner. Shatner wrote a letter of support to "Zumwalt"s crew in April 2014. On 7 December 2015, the ship departed Bath Iron Works for sea trials to allow the Navy and contractors to operate the vessel under rigorous conditions to determine whether "Zumwalt" is ready to join the fleet as an actively commissioned warship.