Monday, March 31, 2025

USS Constellation to be Retired Early

In a move eerily reminiscent of the LCS, the Navy today announced the retirement of the not yet completed USS Constellation, first in its class of a new frigate.  Apparently, the Navy’s concurrency construction approach has resulted in so many unique modifications that the lead ship of the class has lost sufficient commonality with the subsequent class members to justify its retention. 
“Constellation has become such a unique, one-of-a-kind vessel that it would be cost prohibitive to operate and maintain the ship compared to its forthcoming sister ships”, explained Adm. Pete ‘Ketchum’ Inalie.  “In hindsight, we allowed too many change orders and had to make too many one-off modifications to accommodate the change requirements”, he went on to say.  “We now estimate that Constellation has only a 27% commonality with the subsequent ships of the class and that makes the ship unsustainable logistically.”
 
“We’ll complete Constellation’s construction as a means of finalizing the design and trying out new construction techniques but, ultimately, the only economically viable option is immediate retirement of the ship”, Inalie said.
 
“There is ample precedent for this move”, the Admiral stated.  “This is essentially what happened with the first LCS-1 and LCS-2 vessels.”

So much for the parent design eliminating problems, huh?  Another multi-billion dollar failure by the Navy.


 
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[1]Naval Industry News website, “Constellation to Retire Early”, Jacob S. Latter, 1-Apr-2025
https://navalindustryfakenews.com/constellation-pretend-retirement.com

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13 comments:

  1. AnonymousMarch 31, 2025 at 10:52 PM

    Lol

    ReplyDelete
  2. M. BouffantMarch 31, 2025 at 10:55 PM

    What does it say that I didn't realize what day it is, & completely believed this until I saw the "label"?

    ReplyDelete
  3. AnonymousApril 1, 2025 at 4:51 AM

    Imagine what great stories the sailors of the "Connie" will have to tell at veterans' reunions down the road.

    Good times.

    Lutefisk

    ReplyDelete
  4. AnonymousApril 1, 2025 at 6:02 AM

    So is this fake or real? I honestly can't tell with anything coming out of the US anymore.

    ReplyDelete
  5. NICOApril 1, 2025 at 8:11 AM

    Funny but at the same time, damn, that also burns because it's so close to reality!

    Happy April Fool's day everyone!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. ComNavOpsApril 1, 2025 at 8:21 AM

      Every year it gets harder and harder to write an April Fool's Day post because the Navy keeps actually doing all the ridiculous stuff that I'd like to use as April Fool's material. It's so bad that whatever I present, people see it as all too believable which defeats the purpose of an April Fool's post. They aren't supposed to be all that believable. My April Fool's posts run the risk of turning into predictions instead of jokes!

      Hope you enjoyed it, anyway! Have a good day!

      Delete
    2. Chinese GordonApril 1, 2025 at 9:23 AM

      You mean the virtual hypersonic intercept test
      wasn't the April Fools post ?

      Delete
    3. ComNavOpsApril 1, 2025 at 10:15 AM

      Hard to tell the difference, isn't it?!

      Delete
  6. G2milApril 1, 2025 at 12:47 PM

    I'm surprised they haven't decommed the three Zumwalts. The cost to train crews and maintain this odd ship must be huge. Do they even deploy overseas? The first entered service in 2016 and I just checked Wiki and the third ship was launched in 2018 but not yet commissioned as it undergoes "sea trials." They ware being modified to carry hypersonic missiles that our Navy doesn't have.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. NICOApril 1, 2025 at 1:39 PM

      Last news I heard was that first Zumwalt had the hypersonic missile tubes installed and was ready to move out of dock but yeah, you make a great point, a fleet of 3 unique ships must cost a fortune to train and operate......just like LCS, USN can't admit that they made a huge mistake and decommission them outright.....

      Delete
  7. AnonymousApril 1, 2025 at 12:51 PM

    There is a difference - LCS is a strategic blunder made for fighting regional powers without strong naval force. Technical failure (network war - XM501, module, power system, ..) add additional problems. In contrast, Constellations are designed aiming in today's environment - superpower competitions plus combat regional powers - too many missions squeeze in a mid sized boat.

    Pentagon needs to decide Constellations' roles than expect one can do everything. Even subsequent upgrades will not deviate from this decision.

    On technical failure, unfortunately, it is hopeless because the nation's tech base has been shaken as the nation lose manufacturing and engineering talents.

    ReplyDelete
  8. AnonymousApril 1, 2025 at 10:24 PM

    I honestly think that with regards to the FREMM we should have just taken the design as is and licensed a fast track build of 20 ships as an emergency measure/stop gap until we can get a Burke replacement in the water which we should also fast track.
    The instructions from the Secretary of the Navy (or whoever it is that gets to decide these things) should have been crystal clear that any deviations from the French/Italian design would be absolutely minimal (maybe deleting the cappuccino stations).
    It wouldn’t be ideal and in many respects would be a significant compromise but if we’d done this 10 years ago it would be something, which is more than we have now which is looking like the worst of all possible outcomes.

    ReplyDelete

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