POCATELLO — The three teams who will work in shifts to maintain a constant watch aboard the future USS Idaho SSN 799 will have familiar names to Gem State residents.

The Bengals, Vandals and Broncos watch teams will pay tribute to the state’s three public universities, explained Nicholas Meyers, the commanding officer of the under-construction nuclear submarine.

Meyers arrived in Pocatello on Friday with a group of his sailors amid a week-long Idaho visit. The group was also booked to participate in Pocatello’s Independence Day parade, accompanying a scale model of the USS Idaho created by a Pocatello Marine veteran, Don Hulse.

Meyers explained his command philosophy — integrity, discipline, accountability, health habits and sense of ownership — also pays tribute to the 43rd U.S. state. It’s an acronym spelling IDAHO.

The USS Idaho is on pace for a christening by late 2022 and commissioning during the following year. The Virginia-class submarine will be 377 feet long and 34 feet wide and will house 130 sailors. Thus far, 73 crew members have been selected, including three from Idaho.

The submarine will also be capable of desalinizing its own water and making its own air.

Once complete, entering the vessel’s common areas should be like “walking into the state of Idaho,” Meyers said. Gifts from Idahoans will be on display. The ship’s crest will reflect the beauty of the Sawtooth Mountains.

Meyers had never visited Idaho prior to landing in Boise on Wednesday. The state — and its population of residents who display “tremendous pride and honor” — has made a positive first impression on him. Meyers said he witnessed the “military might” of Idaho while touring Boise’s Gowen Field, and he toured the birthplace of naval nuclear propulsion while visiting the Idaho National Laboratory Friday morning.

“The technology developed there is what is going to power the USS Idaho,” Meyers said, during a meet-and-greet event outside of the Red Lion Hotel in Pocatello at 1 p.m. Friday. “We’re never going to need to refuel for the life of the ship, and that’s because of the technology developed here in Idaho.”

This is Meyers’ first stint as a commanding officer. He previously served as executive officer of the USS Greeneville SSN 772, stationed at Pearl Harbor in Hawaii.

Andrew Leonhardt, an electrician’s mate first class, nuclear power, was the sole Idaho resident who made the trip to Idaho who is among the USS Idaho crew. Leonhardt, of Nampa, will help stand guard of the submarine and will aid in building its high-tech power system. Sailors will start standing watch over the USS Idaho beginning next month.

“It’s a tremendous honor to be on the Idaho and being from Idaho,” Leonhardt said. “When it came time for me to pick another command I got extremely lucky and saw that the (Pre-commissioning Unit) Idaho was another option I could take, I made a bunch of phone calls and tried to do whatever I could to fight for the orders and managed to get lucky enough to get them.”

Leonhardt explained the Virginia class is “really the peak-performing, top dog of the underwater warfare world.”

“It’s the worst thing an enemy would want to find underwater,” Leonhardt said.

Other sailors who made the trip were from Kentucky, North Carolina, Maryland and Oregon.

Hulse had previously shown off his USS Idaho replica in Swan Lake and Rigby. It’s the second submarine replica he’s made, following his tribute to the USS Hawkbill.

Hulse, a former Arizona cotton farmer who also flew airplanes, attended nuclear school in the 1950s at the Idaho National Laboratory while enlisted in the Marines.

His replica of the USS Idaho was made from the drop tank of a fighter jet. A friend at Partner Steel welded in a central section to elongate the tank.