In this post, we’ll look a bit closer at drydock
maintenance. The Navy uses both public
(Navy run) shipyards and private industry shipyards. The public yards focus their maintenance
activities on nuclear powered carriers and submarines while private shipyards
focus on conventionally powered ship maintenance.
The Navy operates four public shipyards, as shown in the
table below with the number of drydocks each has.
Public (Navy) Shipyard Drydocks (6)
|
|
Pearl Harbor Naval Shipyard in (Hawaii)
|
4
|
Puget Sound Naval Shipyard (Washington) (c)
|
7
|
Norfolk Naval Shipyard (Virginia) (b)
|
4
|
Portsmouth Naval Shipyard (Maine) (a)
|
3
|
Total Drydocks
|
18
|
(a) only east coast shipyard capable of refueling Los
Angeles class
(b) only east coast shipyard capable of docking carriers
(c) only west coast shipyard capable of docking carriers
|
|
There are 18 drydocks among the four shipyards and the age
of the drydocks is stunningly concerning.
The oldest was built in 1891 (that’s not a typo!) and the newest was
built in 1962. The average age is 89
years old. (2)
As noted in the table, Norfolk Naval Shipyard is the only
public shipyard on the East Coast able to repair Nimitz class aircraft carriers
in drydock and Puget Sound is the only west coast Nimitz carrier-capable
drydock. (4) Currently, the Navy
has no drydock capable of supporting the Ford CVN-78 class aircraft
carrier. Can you believe that? We built a carrier that we can’t drydock and
repair! I hope nothing happens to the
Fords or they’re going to wind up permanent pier-queens.
 |
| Nimitz in Drydock |
Also, most SSN-capable drydocks must be repaired,
rehabilitated, and upgraded in order to support the Virginia/VPM class. (6)
The Navy has also certified 21 private shipyard drydocks for
US Navy maintenance work, as documented in a Navy report to Congress (6) and shown
in the table below along with the number of certified drydocks each yard has.
Private Yard Drydocks (6)
|
|
Atlantic - Norfolk, VA
|
6
|
Atlantic - Mayport, FL
|
2
|
Atlantic - Charleston, SC
|
3
|
Atlantic - Pascagoula, MS
|
1
|
Atlantic - Great Lakes & Bath
|
2
|
Atlantic Total Drydocks
|
14
|
Pacific - San Diego, CA
|
4
|
Pacific - Pearl Harbor, HI
|
1
|
Pacific - Seattle (Everett), WA
|
1
|
Pacific - Portland, OR
|
1
|
Pacific Total Drydocks
|
7
|
Total Drydocks
|
21
|
As the Navy’s internal report to Congress notes, the lack of
drydocks on the Pacific side of the country does not bode well for future war
scenarios with China.
There are three major problems with current drydocks:
- Insufficient numbers
- Insufficient capability
- Poor material condition
The status of the Navy drydocks is succinctly summarized in
a 2017 Navy draft study,
“the
current capacity and capability of the shipyard’s drydocks will not support
future operational needs,” the report [GAO] states. (2)
That pretty well sums it up, doesn’t it? There’s not much more to say … although we
will.
And,
Rear
Adm. Jim Downey, commander of Navy Regional Maintenance Centers and deputy
commander for surface warfare at Naval Sea Systems Command (NAVSEA), told USNI
News in a Sept. 28 interview that his biggest concern is drydock
availability. (3)
RAdm. Downey’s concern is all the more troubling because his
statement comes at a time of intentional reduced maintenance by the Navy and
shrinking fleet numbers. Sooner or
later, the Navy will have to attempt to catch up on the maintenance and then the
drydock availability shortage will become even more acute. If the Navy actually succeeds in adding
numbers of ships to the fleet, again, the drydock shortage will become even
more acute.
So, there you have it.
The Navy is trying to build a 355-ship fleet but lacks the drydock (as
well as general maintenance) capacity to support a fleet of that size. This once again illustrates the Navy’s
fixation on building shiny, sexy, new ships at the expense of maintenance.
The scarcity of drydocks makes them particularly susceptible
to physical vulnerabilities such as floods and earthquakes. As a Navy Matters blog commenter noted,
Also,
another concern I would have, is what would happen if we had a large earthquake
here ? As you know, the Seattle area is prone to some rather large ones here.
We are waiting for the big one, anything over an 8.0 on the Richter scale. (1)
What’s the Navy’s solution to a lack of drydock
availability? According to Downey,
“We’re
looking very hard, where we have sufficient class size – say DDGs, LCSs,
cruisers –where we could solicit those ships together and allow industry to
propose how they would double-dock those ships, or sequence their docking so
they could get more of our requirements done in a schedule that would benefit
them and us.” (3)
Is that mind-boggling or what? All the rest of us would say that the
solution is to build more drydocks but, no, not the Navy. They want to somehow, magically, try to cram
more ships into the available docks.
Typical idiotic Navy approach to a simple problem.
On a more positive, though, at the moment, largely
speculative note, the Navy’s NavSea has initiated a $21B Shipyard
Infrastructure Optimization Program (SIOP) plan to repair and upgrade all Navy
shipyards. Included in the funding is
$4B for drydock repair and upgrades.
Whether the plan comes to fruition or falls by the funding wayside, as
so many plans do, remains to be seen.
Will the Navy sacrifice new ship construction funding to support
shipyard facilities renovation? History
suggests not but we’ll see.
It’s also unclear whether there is any funding for new
drydocks. I cannot find any evidence of
such, only repair and upgrade funding.
Repairs and upgrades will help, most assuredly, but it’s clear from the
various reports that we need more drydocks.
For example, we discussed in previous posts how vulnerable our fleet
support infrastructure is to sabotage and Pearl Harbor type attacks. If the Chinese wanted to seriously hurt our
ability to repair carriers during war, all they’d have to do is sabotage the
only two carrier-capable drydocks we have!
On a closely related repair note, the Shannon & Wilson
engineering firm has an interesting short article on their website about
settlement cracks and repairs for the Puget Sound Naval Shipyard Dry Dock 6.
(7) It’s well worth the short read.
 |
| Puget Sound Drydock #6 |
On an interesting and related side note, Russia’s giant
drydock, PD-50, sank in Oct 2018 with the carrier Kuznetsov inside. (5) This appears to have left Russia with no very
large scale drydock capability although I am nowhere near certain about
that. Certainly, it illustrates the
vulnerability that the failure to procure adequate maintenance facilities can
lead to and which the US Navy finds itself mired in now.
Naval fleets are built and operated with a vast and
absolutely essential support infrastructure which includes repair shipyards,
drydocks, etc. The Navy’s myopic focus
on new construction has placed the Navy in a dire maintenance shortage and
resulted in a hollow force and unsupportable state that will only worsen as new
ship classes come on line that have little or no drydock support availability
or capability. The Navy needs to
recognize that viable fleets are not just a collection of brand new ships but
are a function of support. The Navy
desperately needs to stop focusing on new ships and, instead, turn its
attention to supporting the ships it already has or has committed to
acquiring. We are one major accident
away from seeing a Ford class carrier laid up indefinitely for lack of a
drydock! Given the recent spate of
groundings and collisions, this seems all too plausible a scenario.
Maintenance and drydocks, in particular, are the foundation
upon which a viable naval fleet is built.
Our foundation is too old, ill-maintained, degraded, and too few in
number. We need to turn away from the
shiny, sexy new construction and start building up the fleet support
infrastructure.
(1)Navy Matters blog, “Open Post, H. R. Calhoun,
April 2, 2019
at 6:40 AM,
https://navy-matters.blogspot.com/2019/03/open-post.html?showComment=1554212416346#c5095327064473039416
(2)The Virginian Pilot website, Robert McCabe, 12-Sep-2017,
https://pilotonline.com/business/defense-shipyards/article_3c5e4e79-73c1-56cf-a993-fe12b3398f7c.html
(3)USNI News website, “Navy Facing Drydock Capacity Issue in
Surface Ship Repair; Testing Out New Maintenance Contract to Address Shortfall,
Create Efficiency”, Megan Eckstein, 12-Oct-2017,
https://news.usni.org/2017/10/12/navy-facing-drydock-capacity-issue-surface-ship-repair-testing-new-maintenance-contract-address-shortfall-create-efficiency
(6)Naval Sea Systems Command, “Report to Congress on the
Long-Range Plan for Maintenance and Modernization of Naval Vessels for Fiscal
Year 2020”
https://www.secnav.navy.mil/fmc/fmb/Documents/20pres/FY20%20Long%20Range%20Maintenance+Modernization%20Plan.pdf
(7)Shannon & Wilson website, retrieved 12-Jul-2019,
https://www.shannonwilson.com/puget-sound-naval.html
Well seeing as you mention the Russian dry dock sinking. The USCG yard lost it largest dry dock capability (floating) in the ex Oakridge since it sank and was then held together with bailing wire for another 5 years at much reduced capacity.
ReplyDeleteJust a quick read of wiki page for the USN floating dry docks and repair docks is depressing. The Oakridge was 70 years old and had been used hard continuously by the USN and USCG. Its was clear its had come at 70. What's odd is that the USS Alamogordo had a lighter service record more refits but was sold to Ecuador where its working instead of staying navy reserve or handed of to the USCG.
The other interesting thing is the USN seems to have stopped building/buying floating dry docks almost entirety at the end of WW2 and been in the business of selling what they retained by the 80s. This would appear to a critical lack of foresight. Reading the histories of the WW2 era builds they were towed all over the Pacific to Guam and other places to add forward repair capacity and than post war simply moved back to the US naval yards. This seems incredibly important if you are looking forward to peer type war where you might expect a contested part of say a Pacific war might see Guam and fixed infrastructure there destroyed or degraded,. The ability to replace (and/or replace and expand) that with mobile docks could be critical if you want to sustain a offensive (assuming the US does not loose stage one)
On budgeting I would think unless the Navy itself (the parts that just want new toys) pushes back on yard repairs and upgrades Congress is unlikely to, they do rather like infrastructure on the Hill. But I suppose it is indeed not as sexy as whatever PowerPoint show the Pentagon will put for the FF(X).
Regarding Russia:They have another of the same class, plus various others slightly smaller.
ReplyDeleteI'm seeing multiple articles on the Internet stating that Russia has no equivalent drydock. Do you have a name/designation for this other drydock?
DeleteAlso, as I read it, PD-50 was a one-off build by a manufacturer in Sweden.
There was a story in the National Interest that implied Russia might have large ones in the Far East (By the language) but not clear reference to another one. That is the one I was thinking about
Deletehttps://nationalinterest.org/blog/buzz/no-more-aircraft-carrier-russia-it-might-not-be-bad-idea-58617
But a later story confirmed not such capability
https://thediplomat.com/2018/11/russia-admits-that-it-cant-retrofit-aircraft-carrier-after-accident/
Yes although there other large one is what in the Black sea or Far East and not as I understand it a viable towing destination (for the immediate problem).
ReplyDeleteWhat we need is a transformational dry dock, high speed, nuclear powered, electromagnetic doors and caterpillar
ReplyDeletedrive pumps. The B model will have flight capability.
Lockmart-Austal says it will be only 6 billion and take 4 years. Congress is all for it, 37 states signed up.
But does it have the ability to use adaptive camouflage to aid its stealth.
DeleteDevelopment of cloaking device is running concurrently with the main project as is the self-repairing nano bot enhanced hulls. Savings are expected to be in the triple digits over an expected 100-250 life span.
DeleteWait it needs a rail gun or laser to count for distributed lethality.
ReplyDeleteHow many shifts are these shipyards working?
ReplyDeleteOne would assume for the military not all shifts if commercial since they have other customers. For the military I doubt the budget for people has budged in forever because of sequestration so there is probably no authority to pay overtime and hire to run them 24/7 and you can only do that so long without additional people to do the work the guys knocking off might do - put stuff in order etc.
DeleteA while back, I posted about a Royal Navy idea that I like. They split their line officers between deck/warfare types and engineering types. The engineering types run the ship and the deck/warfare types drive the ship and fight the ship. The First Engineer is co-equal with the First Lieutenant (XO) under the CO, but only deck/warfare types can have command at sea.
ReplyDeleteWhy do I bring it up here?
Because what I see is that since the engineers don't have command at sea, their equivalent positions would be running the shore establishment bases, in particular repair and maintenance facilities, including drydocks. You want to make things get better? Make somebody's career depend on it.
Right now, it's too easy to forget these essential facilities, because nobody's career rests on them. Change that and you change outcomes.
Admiral Nimitz said on viewing Pearl Harbor that the Japanese had made mistakes by 1) attacking on Sunday when many sailors were ashore, 2) destroying the battleships instead of the drydocks, and 3) not destroying the fuel storage tanks. That's how important those facilities are. Maybe the next war does not last long enough to get ships in and out of drydocks for repairs. Or maybe it does. But either way, the highest state of repair our fleet is in at the start, the better our results will be.
I read your comments about the lack of drydocks that are viable for Navy ship repairs. There is a more pressing matter, on larger than the fact we have diminishing drydocking capability....that is the lack of skilled tradesmen/women to work these vessels. I can speak from first hand experience that in the Norfolk/Hampton Roads area, skilled tradesmen are at a premium. The only way shipyards are getting the help they need to work the projects they currently have is to "steal" the tradesmen away from other yards. It does not matter the trade: pipe fitter, welders, ship fitters, insulators, riggers.....they are all short handed. As much as Mike Rowe has expounded on the virtues of "Dirty Jobs" young people these days just do not want to do these jobs. The average age of the worker in two of the shipyards I have worked in has been 57 years old. Drydocks are good, but having the labor force to complete the repairs that are needed is critical.
ReplyDeleteThe lead time to turn people employed in retail, food service, and other consumer-facing semi-skilled/unskilled professions into entry-level skilled shipbuilders is significantly shorter than the lead time to construct additional heavy infrastructure. It still takes time, as much as a year, but the smartest early investment is in drydocks and other heavy infrastructure, then skilled labor, then new warships. As CNOps notes, congress loves jobs. We're approaching full employment currently, so any large increase in the shipbuilding workforce will have to pull from other sectors, but those consumer-facing jobs I mentioned aren't exactly mission critical, and they don't pay nearly as well as the skilled positions that we actually need. All it should take to start significantly shifting employment trends in that direction is some targeted advertising and subsidies for the training programs, which are the only non-psychological barriers (i.e. "young people just do not want to do these jobs") for most of the target population.
DeleteIf we're smart about it, we can even *not* demilitarize the economy after we win, and they can work in the world-renowned US commercial shipbuilding industry.
"There is a more pressing matter, … the lack of skilled tradesmen/women ... young people these days just do not want to do these jobs."
DeleteYou are spot on! The problem is our education system actively discourages any educational course except college. Failure to go to college is presented as failure to our students. The old days (my school days!) saw a robust vocational ed path. Unfortunately, that path has been abandoned.
The simple reality is that not every student is suited for college. We need to bring back vocational ed.
Great comment!
interesting story on yard infrastructure, not so much facts on the ground however.
ReplyDeletehttps://warisboring.com/u-s-navy-could-covert-philippines-shipyard-into-repair-maintenance-facility/
If the USN was to swing some kind deal/lease it a bit of a shot at China If it goes to a Chinese state owned company well I guess will a sense of which way in the wind the Philippians is swinging.
Americans are well liked in the Philippines, but probably trusted less than the Chinese.
ReplyDeleteThere is still a lot of controversy over Scarborough Shoal in particular and how trustworthy or not the US is as an ally. I think the general consensus is that the US cannot be trusted at all.
The Chinese are plowing a lot of investment into road and rail infrastructure in particular and its very welcome. Once the new bridges are built I may eventually be able to drive from our home outside Bacolod to Manila. However, no one really understands what the final cost may be as its not just a question of money.
And the Philippines does NOT want to get caught in the middle of a war between China and the US. Hard to blame them really as there is no upside to it.
Good articles here:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2019/03/19/us-quietly-made-big-splash-about-south-china-sea/?utm_term=.70064aee560f
https://www.forbes.com/sites/anderscorr/2017/04/14/take-defense-treaty-action-for-philippine-sovereignty-in-south-china-sea/#12a372f66ed3
https://news.abs-cbn.com/-depth/07/25/12/will-us-defend-philippines-if-china-attacks
"However, no one really understands what the final cost may be as its not just a question of money."
DeleteGifts from China come at great cost … eventually.
"And the Philippines does NOT want to get caught in the middle of a war between China and the US."
There is no middle or neutral ground. It's only a question of when you'll have to choose sides. And, of course, failure to choose, is a choice and carries with it its own set of consequences.
If you attempt neutrality, China will use you (remember the infrastructure gifts? the bill will come due) against the US.
Given the strategic location of the Philippines, you're in the middle of the China-US conflict whether you want to be or not.
Choose … or not. Either has consequences.
"Gifts from China come at great cost … eventually."
DeleteIndeed.
"Given the strategic location of the Philippines, you're in the middle of the China-US conflict whether you want to be or not."
I do think there is a question of the scale of the conflict. Personally, I believe any conventional war is going to be over very quickly and is probably going to end as a stalemate while everyone goes home and licks their wounds. I can't see the logistical problems allowing any other outcome.
So if the Philippines doesn't allow either Chinese or US bases they may get away with little damage. If you host a Chinese shipyard, or an American one, bad things are likely to happen.
The reality, once you accept Chinese money, is that you are going to end up in some form of client state relationship with China. Not sure everyone that needs to has thought that through properly.
" if the Philippines doesn't allow either Chinese or US bases they may get away with little damage."
DeleteDo you really think that if China decides it wants a base in the Philippines to use against the US that it will be dissuaded by the Philippines simply stating their neutrality? The Chinese will simply take the area they want. They've proven that they have no respect for international treaties, laws, and regulations (the UNCLOS tribunal, of which they are a signatory, comes to mind). They've already seized Scarborough Shoal. They've incurred into Vietnamese, Philippine, and other countries territorial waters on many occasions. They've used military force and the threat of military force to get what they want. Do you really think simply declaring yourselves off limits will stop China?
I think in general the Chinese prefer to get what they want through commerce and trade. The islands are a slightly different thing as there isn't much trade involved aside from a few fish.
DeleteI do strongly believe any large-scale shooting war in the area will be over in days.
The Chinese don't do power projection (yet), and the Americans can't do it against a major enemy as they won't have the log train to support it. Everything necessary to support a serious war in the US is missing.
Weapons stocks of all kinds, trained large scale military, Fleet size, ASW surface assets, MCM capability, Fleet repair and construction assets inc drydocks as discussed here. Fleet transports and oilers!
Naval air wings too small, no dedicated naval tankers, almost no AF heavy bombers, limited deep strike capability, decayed long range air interceptor capability.
And the underlying fact that the actual fighting fleet size is nowhere near claimed because LCS, Zumwalts and of course the Ford. And the fleet we do have is pretty certain to under-perform in at least some areas because Seventh Fleet disasters in recent years.
I figure the Chinese have a lot of the same or similar problems so looking for an all in - drag out scrap is probably not a really good idea for either side.
Whether or not that balance is going to change in the next few years? Hmmmm.
"I do strongly believe any large-scale shooting war in the area will be over in days. "
DeleteI strongly believe any large scale war will be a long, drawn out one for the very reasons you cite as leading to a short war! The fact that neither side possesses the overwhelming strength to quickly and decisively end a war assures that it will be a long one. This is exactly what happened in WWII. No country had the initial ability to quickly win the war so it became a long, drawn out war of industry and attrition.
" Everything necessary to support a serious war in the US is missing."
Study your history. No country enters a war with everything it needs. You enter and fight the initial battles with what you have and then, assuming you haven't won or lost, you settle in to a war of production. This is exactly what the US did in WWII. After the initial battles against Japan and Germany, we settled in and concentrated on gearing up our production, thus assuring a long war.
I don't believe we're going to have a war any time soon. But mistakes happen.
ReplyDelete"Study your history. No country enters a war with everything it needs. You enter and fight the initial battles with what you have and then, assuming you haven't won or lost, you settle in to a war of production. This is exactly what the US did in WWII. After the initial battles against Japan and Germany, we settled in and concentrated on gearing up our production, thus assuring a long war."
WWII is 75 years ago and a lot has changed. This one is much more likely to be 'you fight with what you have' as there won't be time to build much new stuff. Complicated systems and munitions intersecting with loss of the means and skills of production.
I'm keeping my fingers crossed. I expect we're going to end up with three or so areas of hegemony. China and South/South East Asia/Africa. Europe. The Americas. And maybe Russia if it doesn't collapse first. Don't know where the Middle East fits as its such an artificial construct anyways (because Sykes-Picot). Speaking of history and Winston's Hiccup.
"This one is much more likely to be 'you fight with what you have' as there won't be time to build much new stuff."
DeleteThat's the point! Once the initial, front line stuff all gets destroyed and neither side has won or lost, what do you think will happen? Having started a war and lost men and equipment on a large scale, neither side is likely to just say, hey why don't we quit, having accomplished nothing. Both sides will settle into massive war production and the war will go on and on.
Seriously, why would you think both sides would suddenly stop, having accomplished little or nothing, after a brief conflict when they were willing to enter the war to gain objectives? The US might think that way, depending on how the war started - if we get 'Pearl Harbored' we won't quit. China isn't going to quit without accomplishing their objectives. They don't care about casualties like the US often does.
There is no reason to believe a short war and every reason to believe a long war.