A zone is a geographic region of ship. The boundaries of the zone can be arbitrary, but to maximize survivability, the zones of multiple distributed systems as well as damage control zones should be aligned. For shipboard distributed systems, this typically means the zone boundaries are the exterior skin of the ship and selected transverse watertight bulkheads. The zone boundaries may rise above the watertight bulkheads into the superstructure, or the superstructure may be composed of one or more zones independent of the zones within the hull.