Constellation Construction Progress

We’ll probably never know the real reason why the Navy decided to terminate the Constellation program but one of the factors certainly had to be the glacially slow pace of construction progress.
 
Constellation was laid down 12-Apr-2024 although, as with most modern ships, construction of subassemblies had already begun.  Now, Nov-2025, 19+ months later, the ship is reportedly 12% complete.[1]  That’s 12% in 19+ months.  That’s an average of 0.6% construction progress per month.  At that rate, it would require 167 months (13.9 years!) to complete the construction and even then, that would only be the basic hull.  Fitting out would require many more months.
 
Fourteen years to partially build a frigate?
 
If you were SecNav, would you have continued this program?

 

Constellation Under Construction?

 

 
________________________________

 
[1]USNI News website, “Navy Cancels Constellation-class Frigate Program, Considering New Small Surface Combatants”, Sam LaGrone, 25-Nov-2025,
https://news.usni.org/2025/11/25/navy-cancels-constellation-class-frigate-program-considering-new-small-surface-combatants

Foreign Ships Are Magnificent

Without a doubt, the US has shipbuilding problems with every recent naval ship program coming in badly over budget, over schedule, riddled with quality problems and non-functional equipment, delivered in only partially complete condition, unfit for combat, and sometimes actually damaged and yet the Navy has accepted and commissioned every ship. In contrast, it is almost an article of faith among naval observers and commentators that foreign ships are magnificent wonders of naval accomplishment, being cheap, quick to build, and testaments to naval technology and quality.  In fact, one of the most commonly proffered solutions to US naval shipbuilding problems is to have our ships be built by foreign companies, either in foreign countries or by having foreign builders come to the US and establish facilities.
 
Are foreign ships and shipbuilders really miracles of modern naval construction, as so many believe?  Let’s dig a bit deeper and see.
 
The first problem in trying to assess foreign ship construction programs is that there is almost no information available.  The US publishes data on naval vessels in a variety of government reports, public forums, blog postings, and general news sources.  In contrast, there is almost no publicly available information on foreign ship acquisition programs.  That leaves us to reason out the situation from the snippets of information we can find.
 
Let’s look at some examples of foreign ships and shipbuilding problems and see if we can discern a pattern.
  
 
HMS Prince of Wales – The Royal Navy’s aircraft carrier Prince of Wales, commissioned in Dec 2019, suffered a propulsion system breakdown in Aug 2022 resulting in damage to the shaft, propeller, and rudder.  Repairs sidelined the ship until Jul 2023.
 
HMS Queen Elizabeth -  The Royal Navy’s aircraft carrier Queen Elizabeth, commissioned in Dec 2017, suffered a propulsion system breakdown in Jul 2019 and had to abandon a scheduled NATO exercise.
 
Helge Ingstad – The Norwegian frigate suffered a collision and subsequently sank due to faulty design and construction flaws that allowed flooding to pass from compartment to compartment through shaft seals.
 
HMS Triumph – In 1988 the Royal Navy Trafalgar class submarine, then under construction, had a large section mistakenly welded into position upside down.
 
Baden-Württemberg F125 Frigate – In 2017, the German frigate failed its trials and was rejected by the German Navy.  Problems included a permanent list, faulty radar, improper fireproof fuel tank coatings, excessive weight, subsystem interface defects, and hardware/software integration
 
New Zealand/Canada ANZAC Frigate Upgrade – The $375M original cost has jumped to $639M.  Project planning began in 2006 with contracts being awarded in 2014 and completion occurring in 2022/23.  That’s a 17 year upgrade project!  The work was performed in Canada.
 
Type 45 Destroyer - The Type 45’s advanced propulsion system was found in 2010 to be unreliable, especially when operating in the heat of the Persian Gulf.  HMS Dauntless was laid up in 2016 to undergo a major refit that would solve the propulsion problems.  The project took twice as long as estimated and was not completed until June 2022.
 
Digital modelling was used to de-risk some of the issues but in practice, the work proved more complex than expected.[2]
 
Soviet/Russian Ship Quality – Construction quality problems have been well documented by interior photos, tour observations, post-Cold War reports, etc.
 
For But Not With – Foreign ship builds widely use the ‘for but not with’ method of construction which delivers ships without necessary weapons and sensors but allows the builder/country to claim reduced costs.  Some foreign ships also are known to reuse weapons from a retired ship – not necessarily a bad thing but, again, it results in artificially low cost claims when compared to purely new construction.
 
Austal – The Australian shipbuilder, Austal, built a facility in the US to manufacture the Independence variant LCS and that turned out to be a disaster with cost overruns, schedule slippages, specifications not met, and a host of design and quality issues.
 
FREMM/Constellation – The US Constellation class frigate, based on the parent FREMM design, had to be extensively redesigned to meet US survivability standards.  This is especially eye-opening given how lax and minimal US standards have become!  This suggests that a significant portion of the supposed lower foreign costs may come from significantly reduced standards.
 
French Frigate Misfire – In 2018, a French frigate’s attempted cruise missile strike on suspected Syrian chemical weapon sites failed when the missile salvo failed to launch.  A second frigate had to take the tasking.
 
As noted, there is almost no information, good or bad, about SKorean and Japanese naval ship quality.  Unfortunately, SKorea and Japan are two of the commonly suggested foreign shipbuilders that we should use/emulate.
 
 
Discussion/Conclusion
 
Any one of the above cited incidents could be explained away as a one-of-a-kind occurrence but the overall pattern clearly demonstrates that foreign shipbuilders suffer the same kinds of quality and design problems that American ships and shipbuilders do.  There is nothing magic about foreign ships or builders.
 
Claims of cost savings inevitably fail to account for extensive subsidies, reuse of equipment, ‘for but not with’ practices, lower standards, etc.  Thus, foreign cost savings claims are highly suspect, bordering on false.
 
The most interesting data point is the Austal manufacturing effort.  A foreign shipbuilder came to the US, supposedly bringing the many miracles of foreign shipbuilding, built a facility and, contrary to what so many expected, suffered the exact same problems that US builders do.  The main thing that changed when they came to the US was the degree of public scrutiny.  All their failures and shortcomings were publicized.  Thus, the idea of bringing a foreign shipbuilder to the US to construct a facility is almost guaranteed to produce no improvements.  A foreign builder in the US would be subject to the same laws, regulations, work force issues, and so forth that US builders are and those issues would have the same negative impacts. 
 
The pattern of incidents also suggest that foreign builders build to lower design standards than US builders which leads to impressions of lower cost.  Given the steady lowering of US standards, this is shocking that foreign navies/builders would have even lower standards.
 
In short, I would have no great objections to using a foreign shipyard for US naval construction but I would expect no improvement in quality, cost, or schedule issues.  There is nothing magic about foreign shipyards other than their greatly reduced public visibility.
 
There is also the issue of security.  One would have to assume that any technology or design specifications that were sent to a foreign builder would wind up in China’s hands and that’s a concern.  Of course, it’s not as if our home-grown security has prevented the Chinese from acquiring all the information they could want so maybe security isn’t that big of an issue!
 
A separate aspect of the consideration of foreign shipbuilders is that of competition.  The number of US naval shipbuilders has steadily dwindled to a precious few which, without a doubt, has led to non-competition and all its associated ills.  The use of foreign shipbuilders would, if nothing else, provide a degree of competition that has been lacking.  It’s not even debatable that competition is a positive that helps drive improvements and reduced costs.  I find this to be the most persuasive argument for foreign shipyards, by far.
 
As with so many things in life, the grass is always greener on the other side of the fence but, upon closer examination, it isn’t really.
 
 
 
 
___________________________________

 
[1]IEEE Spectrum website, “New German Warship Fails Sea Trials Due to Tech Woes”, Robert Charette, 7-Feb-2018,
https://spectrum.ieee.org/new-german-frigate-fails-tests
 
[2]https://www.navylookout.com/in-focus-the-power-improvement-project-for-the-royal-navys-type-45-destroyers/#:~:text=One%20of%20the%20many%20causes%20of%20problems%20was,inherent%20redundancy%20that%20MEs%20were%20accustomed%20to%20having.

SSN Maintenance Backlog

We just read about the USS Boise (SSN-764), which has been idled since Jan 2015 awaiting dry dock availability and is finally beginning its maintenance period.  The optimistic unrealistic hope is that Boise returns to service in late 2023 or sometime in 2024 which would be an 8-9 year period of idleness.  You would hope that this is some sort of sick April Fool’s joke but it isn’t.  This is the sad reality of our naval maintenance effort.
 
Was Boise just a bad luck, bad circumstances, fluke?  How is the rest of the SSN submarine fleet doing as regards maintenance?
 
According to a just released CRS report, 37% of the SSN fleet is currently idled in, or awaiting, depot maintenance, overhauls, and dry dock availability and are non-operational.[1]  That’s 18 of the 49 SSN subs in the fleet that are sitting idle, leaving just 31 operational SSNs in the US fleet.
 
China doesn’t need to worry about our submarine fleet … it’s sitting idle.
 
Sure, we couldn’t keep SSNs, arguably the most lethal component of our military, in service but we made sure we kept building LCS so that we could retire them as they completed construction and we made sure that we built all the Zumwalts and we pushed the Ford through despite having utterly unreliable catapults, traps, and weapon elevators.
 
New hulls … yes!
 
Maintenance … no.

Our Submarine Force?

 
 
 
_______________________________

 
[1]Congressional Research Service, “Navy Virginia (SSN-774) Class Attack Submarine Procurement: Background and Issues for Congress”, Ronald O’Rourke, 6-Jul-2023, RL32418

Portsmouth Shipyard Upgrade

ComNavOps constantly looks for positive news about the Navy but seldom finds any so this is a very welcome, very positive development.  The Navy is beginning to follow through on previous promises to upgrade the public shipyards (see, “Shipyard Improvement Plan”).

Naval Facilities Engineering Systems Command (NAVFAC) awarded a $1.7-billion construction project Aug. 13 to expand and reconfigure a dry dock complex at Portsmouth Naval Shipyard (PNSY) in Kittery, Maine, to increase the shipyard's capacity to maintain, modernize, and repair the Navy's attack submarines and return them to the fleet on time. (1)

 

The seven-year project, part of the Navy’s comprehensive Shipyard Infrastructure Optimization Program (SIOP), will construct an addition to Dry Dock 1 within the existing flood basin area, as well as new concrete floors, walls, pump systems, caissons, and other mechanical and electrical utilities, enhancing the 221-year-old shipyard’s ability to handle multiple Los Angeles-class and Virginia-class submarines. (1)

 

I don’t really have anything to add to this and I normally don’t simply repeat news items without any value-added analysis but this is just too good not to take note of and ‘celebrate’.  

Portsmouth Naval Shipyard

 Outstanding, Navy!

 

I love being able to say that.

 

 

________________________________________

 

(1)Naval News website, “U.S. Navy Investing $1.7 Billion to Improve Portsmouth Naval Shipyard”, Staff, 18-Aug-2021,

https://www.navalnews.com/naval-news/2021/08/u-s-navy-investing-1-7-billion-to-improve-portsmouth-naval-shipyard/

USS Wayne E. Meyer Completes Maintenance

Sometimes it’s good to just be reminded of the routine activities of the fleet.  For example, the Burke class destroyer USS Wayne E. Meyer, DDG-108, just completed a Dry Docking Selected Restricted Availability at the Pearl Harbor Naval Shipyard and Intermediate Maintenance Facility (PHNSY & IMF).(1)  This is an extensive maintenance period during which the ship’s hull and systems are maintained and modernized.  The maintenance period began 24-Mar-2020 and the dry docking portion was completed on 5-Nov-2020.

 

USS Wayne E. Meyer was commissioned in 2009 so this maintenance period is occurring at around the ten year mark of the ship’s life.

 

I can’t find a detailed description of the work list but the following is a brief description of the similar maintenance period for Wayne E. Meyer’s sister ship, the O’Kane, DDG-77, just to give you a feel for the scope of the work.

 

… major alterations include a bow strengthening modification, advanced galley modifications to enhance meal prep times and serving capacity, two berthing complex renovations, mast preservation, antenna overhaul, and shafts/rudders/propeller reconditioning.  …

 

The projected scope of work is in excess of 80,000 man-days. The predicted manpower requirements are more than 500 people per day. (4)

 

Vigor Marine acted as the prime contractor, apparently a first for PHNSY & IMF.  Following is the contract award announcement which puts the price of the maintenance at around $90M.

 

Vigor Marine LCC, Portland, Oregon, is awarded an $89,336,289 firm-fixed-price contract for the execution of the USS Wayne E. Meyer (DDG 108) fiscal 2020 dry-docking selected restricted availability (DSRA).  This availability will include a combination of maintenance, modernization and repair of the USS Wayne E. Meyer.  This is a Chief of Naval Operations scheduled DSRA.  The purpose is to maintain, modernize and repair the USS Wayne E. Meyer.  Vigor Marine LLC will provide the resources capable of completing, coordinating and integrating multiple areas of ship maintenance, repair and modernization for the USS Wayne E. Meyer.  This contract includes options, which, if exercised, would bring the cumulative value of this contract to $97,954,544.  Work will be performed in Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, and is expected to be completed by November 2020.  Fiscal 2020 operations and maintenance (Navy) funding in the amount of $89,336,289 will be obligated at time of award and will expire at the end of the current fiscal year.  This requirement was competitively solicited using full and open competition via the Federal Business Opportunities website, with one offer received.  The Naval Sea Systems Command, Washington, District of Columbia, is the contracting activity (N00024-20-C-4464).(2)

 

Vigor Industrial, of which Vigor Marine is a subsidiary, is based in Portland, Oregon and builds tugs, ferries, and barges as well as performing ship maintenance and repair.  According to Wikipedia, Vigor has seven facilities with ten drydocks, more than 17,000 feet of pier space, and over 2,000 employees.(3)  The company traces back to Todd Pacific Shipyards and Kaiser Shipyard, among others.

 

Interestingly,

 

Vigor announced in late 2017 that it had won a $1 billion contract to produce U.S. Army landing craft, the largest contract in its history. The company selected Vancouver, Washington as the production site for the vessels.(3)

 

We’ve often discussed the possibility and desirability of encouraging the growth of smaller shipyards to eventually handle larger naval construction and this might be an example of such a yard.

 

USS Wayne E. Meyer Departing Dry Dock In Pearl Harbor

This availability is an example of the kind of regular maintenance that the Navy so desperately needs and yet is routinely deferring for various [poor and unwise] reasons.  This is good, if routine and unremarkable, news.  My only concern is whether all the required work is being performed.  I’m hearing too many stories of ships coming out of maintenance periods with work left undone.  For example, the Port Royal, which ran aground off Hawaii a few years ago, had just come out of a maintenance period and yet had several broken systems including GPS and navigation.  If all the required work is being completed, this is good news.  If not, this is just a partial band-aid.  

 

 

 

  

 

 

________________________________________

 

(1)https://www.cpf.navy.mil/news.aspx/110956

 

(2)https://www.hstoday.us/federal-pages/department-of-defense-contracts-for-dec-17-2019-2/

 

(3)https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vigor_Industrial

 

(4)https://www.navaltoday.com/2015/05/14/uss-okane-starts-biggest-drydocking-period-in-phnsy-history/

Keep Buying More Ships

Recently, I mentioned that we’re producing ship captains and crews whose tours never leave dock.  I get the feeling that some of you may not have believed me.  Well, here’s a timely example.

The move of attack submarine USS Boise (SSN-764) to the dry dock at Newport News Shipbuilding in Virginia ... after the sub has been sitting pier side at nearby Norfolk Naval Shipyard for more than four years waiting for maintenance to begin. (1)

A submarine – one of our precious and most valuable assets – sitting pier side for four years waiting for maintenance.

Let’s just keep buying new ships, though, Navy.  Why invest in shipyards and drydocks when we can get Congress to approve new ships?  So what if most of our carriers and half our sub fleet is sitting idle.  As long as we can buy new ships, we’re happy!

How has no one been fired?

Nothing To Do But Wait

______________________________

(1)USNI News website, “NAVSEA Says Attack Sub Repairs Much Improved as USS Boise Enters Yard Following 4-Year Wait”, Megan Eckstein, 26-May-2020,

https://news.usni.org/2020/05/26/navsea-says-attack-sub-repairs-much-improved-as-uss-boise-enters-yard-following-4-year-wait

Zumwalt Delivered

The US Navy has announced that the USS Zumwalt has finally completed the last phase of its construction, the installation and activation of its combat systems, and been delivered to the Navy.(1)

Zumwalt was laid down in 2011.  It’s been delivered, complete, in 2020.  That’s 9 years to build a ship. 

Nine years to build a ship.

Nine years.

What are we going to do when war comes and we start losing ships and need to replace them?  Are we going to wait nine years for the first replacement?  We really need to rethink our entire conceptual approach to ship design and shipbuilding.

Zumwalt Plank Owner Awaiting Delivery

__________________________________

(1)Commander, US Pacific Fleet, 24-Apr-2020,

https://www.cpf.navy.mil/news.aspx/130601

CNO Richardson Incriminates Himself

CNO Richardson just issued the most self-incriminating statement imaginable.  The Government Accountability Office (GAO) just issued a report on the submarine maintenance problems. (1)

… a recent Government Accountability Office report that found the Navy has lost more than $1.5 billion and thousands of operational days over the past decade due to attack submarines caught in maintenance delays or sitting idle while awaiting an availability. (1)

Soak up those numbers … $1.5 BILLION and THOUSANDS of operational days lost !!!!!!!!!!!

Did you catch how long it’s been going on?  - From the quote, ‘over the past decade’.

CNO Richardson’s reaction?

Richardson, in a media call on Thursday during his Thanksgiving visit to USS Harry S. Truman (CVN-75), told USNI News that he found “no surprises in that report. Every bit of information in that is information we’re very, very aware of. (1)

So, CNO Richardson, you have a massive, massive problem facing the fleet, you weren’t surprised by any of it, and you’ve been “very, very aware” of it?  So what in the hell have you been doing about it besides sitting on your ass?  Talk about dereliction of duty!  This is incompetence on a massive scale.

CNO Richardson’s statement is about as self-incriminating an indictment of his incompetence as is possible to imagine.

What does the GAO have to say about the Navy’s pathetic efforts?

The Navy has started to address challenges related to workforce shortages and facilities needs at the public shipyards. However, it has not effectively allocated maintenance periods among public shipyards and private shipyards that may also be available to help minimize attack submarine idle time.

So, even after a decade or more, the Navy’s effort at a solution is feeble and ineffective.

Why does CNO Richardson still have a job?

______________________________________

(1)USNI News website, “CNO: ‘No Surprises’ in GAO Report on Submarine Readiness Challenges”, Megan Eckstein, 26-Nov-2018,

https://news.usni.org/2018/11/26/cno-richardson-no-surprises-gao-report-highlighting-attack-sub-readiness-challenges

Shipyard Improvement Plan

Assuming it comes to fruition – not a safe assumption with the Navy - , here’s some genuine good news about our four publicly owned naval shipyards.  You’ll recall that our shipyards have lost the capability to build ships and are in, literally, crumbling condition (see, “Government Run Shipyards”).

Now, NavSea, prodded by Congress, has produced a plan to rebuild the shipyards. (1, 2)  The 20 year plan (right there is reason for skepticism since no 20 plan is ever carried to fruition) proposed spending $21B to revitalize the yards, concentrating on three main aspects.

• Dry Dock recapitalization - As the Executive Summary of NavSea’s plan notes, drydock investment is needed in order to service the Ford and Virginia class vessels.

• Facility layout and optimization - Facility layout at the yards needs extensive modification.  NavSea plans to resize, reconfigure, and relocate facilities to optimize work flow.

• Capital equipment modernization - NavSea plans to reinvest in capital equipment that is beyond its service life, obsolete, and no longer supported by the original manufacturer.

This is good news on its own but even better is that the Navy seems to have a logical approach to the project.

“We’re not going to get $21 billion in one year to go do this, nor could we execute that amount of money, so … we’ll go do that work in a way that allows us to get the most important work done as quickly as we can to get the biggest return on investment to the taxpayer, and then also takes into account work that’s ongoing in the yard.”

The Navy is currently in the process of working with a civil engineering firm to draw out what the final end state will look like at each of the four public shipyards, and will then determine how to plan the work around one-year budget cycles, Naval Sea Systems Command commander Vice Adm. Tom Moore told USNI News. (1)

While I noted at the outset that the length of the plan, 20 years, is cause enough to be skeptical about its success, the Navy even seems to be aware of this aspect!

“That’s going to be the challenge, for sure, is to keep people interested over a 20-year period. For anything that’s a challenge. I think the selling point to everybody has been … if you want to get to a force of 355 (ships) and you want to be more productive going forward, this is a key component of it,” Moore said. (1)

The Navy has correctly identified the monumentally obvious connection between fleet size and shipyard maintenance facilities!

Portsmouth Shipyard

Another worrisome aspect of this project is the Navy’s well known, well demonstrated fixation on advanced technology at the expense of actual usefulness.  In the article, Moore cites a “need” to incorporate digital technology, Wi-Fi, 3D printing, computer machining, and electronic documentation.  As we’ve so often discussed, existing technology is fine but the Navy seems to always want leap ahead technology that never pans out.  They need to restrain themselves and stick to existing technology.

Technology fixation aside, NavSea’s plan is a good one and the Navy seems to have a solid grasp on how to execute it.  If the funding can be maintained, $1B each year ought to yield substantial improvements to the yards and, ultimately, to the state of the fleet.  ComNavOps gives this project his wholehearted approval and support. 

While I’m highly critical of Navy leadership for allowing the shipyards to deteriorate to the horrific point they have, I’ll give the Navy full credit for finally recognizing the problem and doing something meaningful about it.  I also have to give Congress full credit for their oversight and prodding without which the project would likely not exist.  This is what Congress is supposed to do – well done! 

I’ll attempt to revisit this from time to time and track the progress.

The Executive Summary of NavSea’s plan is available on-line (2).

___________________________________

(1)USNI News, “NAVSEA Looking for Early Wins as it Kicks Off 20-Year Yard Modernization”, Megan Eckstein, 5-Sep-2018,

https://news.usni.org/2018/09/05/navsea-looking-early-wins-kicks-off-20-year-yard-modernization

(2)https://news.usni.org/2018/09/12/executive-summary-to-naval-shipyard-recapitalization-and-optimization-plan

Government Run Shipyards

During various post discussions, we’ve occasionally kicked around the idea of government run ship building yards as an alternative to the high costs and low quality seen of late from the commercial yards.  The proffered theory has been that the government couldn’t do any worse and might be better.  Of course, the evidence is overwhelming that the government wouldn’t do a better job as demonstrated by the government’s failings at running the Post Office, Social Security, various welfare programs, Medicare/Medicaid, Obamacare, and so forth.  We now have a report from the GAO (1) regarding the material condition and state of the four existing government owned and operated shipyards (Puget Sound, Norfolk, Pearl Harbor, and Portsmouth) and it puts to rest any forlorn hope that the government could successfully run a shipbuilding yard.

To put it in a nutshell, the four shipyards are barely functional, ancient, decrepit, neglected, horribly maintained, and woefully underfunded.  This is the most direct evidence that the government would be incapable of successfully running a shipbuilding yard.

Let’s look a bit closer.

Why do we even have government owned shipyards?  From the GAO report,

“The naval shipyards are essential to national defense and fulfill the legal requirement for the Department of Defense to maintain a critical logistics capability that is government owned and operated to support an effective and timely response for mobilization, national defense contingency situations, and other emergency requirements.”

“The naval shipyards provide depot-level maintenance, which involves the most comprehensive and time-consuming maintenance work, including ship overhauls, alterations, refits, restorations, nuclear refuelings, and deactivations—activities crucial to supporting Navy readiness.”

These shipyards perform all the Navy’s nuclear maintenance activities.

Unfortunately, the yards are physically crumbling due to lack of care and concern on the part of the Navy.

“The Navy acknowledges that there has been a history of under-investment in shipyard restoration and modernization needs.”

Really?  The Navy recognizes that they have failed to maintain the material condition of the yards and yet has consistently opted not to remedy the situation.  That’s incompetence, gross negligence, and, given the critical nature of the services the yards provide to our national security, approaching treason.

Given the Navy’s failure, Congress has attempted to step in.

“Recognizing this issue, Congress passed a law in fiscal year 2007 that requires the Secretary of the Navy to invest in the capital budgets of the Navy depots a total amount equal to not less than 6 percent of the average total combined maintenance, repair, and overhaul workload funded at all the Navy depots for the preceding three fiscal years.”

I have no idea what dollar amount that works out to be but I doubt it’s anywhere near sufficient.

I trust this ends the argument that the government should operate naval construction shipyards?

(1)Government Accounting Office, “Naval Shipyards – Actions Needed To Improve Poor Conditions That Affect Operations”, Sep 2017, GAO-17-548