Hit the Slides! Surface Navy 2020: The Drift, S. II, Vol. XI

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Navigation Brief

Alexandria -- We all like the familiar, right?

At some point, all the albums I listen to regularly were new and exciting. But for the most part, with a couple exceptions each year, my playlists are pretty static. Most of the albums I listen to today are the same ones I grooved hard to in college or in the Navy. Sometime around, say, 2009, the rapid expansion of my album rotation slowed to a 1-3 album per year pace, and most of the new albums are from the same bands I listened to a decade ago.

So, on the theme of familiarity, I've returned to a semi-regular feature here at the Drift, anchored by a bad Metallica pun from an album I've been grooving on since I was 11. Each year at Surface Navy Association, and again at SeaAirSpace, Naval Sea Systems Command lets their program managers out of their cages to talk to the media. And their accompanying slides are always really interesting.

For tonight's Drift, it's time to Hit the Slides and see what's up in the world of shipbuilding programs. Time to throw on a pair of headphones, cue up Kill 'Em All, and give you the highlights from this year's program briefs.

Let's Drift!

DBL

Programs for Days

DDG 51

Currently 13 Flight III ships under contract through FY22 (But we know that might change, now don't we). There are 21 total DDG-51s under contract across the program.

• First Flight III keel laid in October 2019, on schedule for an IOC in 2024. Currently 24 percent complete
• AN/SPY-6 scheduled to arrive in June 2020
• Multiyear from 2018 gave 5 ships to Bath Iron Works and six to Huntington Ingalls Industries
• First DDG from the Multiyear, DDG-128, will start fabrication in April
• Light off for Aegis Baseline 10, which integrates air and missile defense, is slated for 2022

DDG-1000

If you missed my conversation with Capt. Drew Carlson you can check that out here. We talked about what sailors talk about: So, how does it ride?

Here’s how the destroyer Zumwalt’s stealthy design handles stormy seas

From the program brief, here we go.

• Zumwalt will get underway a bunch this year.
• The final delivery and combat systems activation will happen in March
• Monsoor started combat systems install at BAE in April and will wrap up in the second quarter of this year
• Johnson is 90 percent complete, will deliver in December
• The Zumwalt's IOC is in September 2021

Ford

• Ford has 4 of 11 elevators working and certified
• 747 launches and recoveries to date
• Ford is going to be underway a ton this year, 220 days total over 11 underways (RIP Ford Crew)
• Post-delivery trial and testing period throuhg the second quarter of next year, then full-ship shock trials in the third and fourth quarter of 2021.

Future Carriers

Here's the delivery dates for the next carriers:

• JFK, 2024
• Enterprise, 2028
• Doris Miller, 203

Here's what they have to say about the program:

• Still saying the block buy saves $4 billion
• "The CVN 80 and CVN 81 two-ship buy strategy further improves on CVN 79 efforts to frontload as much work as possible to the earliest phases of construction, where work is both predictable and more cost efficient."

Unmanned Systems

Hoo boy, here goes.

• Large Umanned Surface Vessel will be in design & construction and testing through mid-2024
• Ghost Fleet Overlord ships are in Phase 2 experimentation through this year and will go to Surface Development Squadron after that while payloads are developed.
• The parallel LUSV Prototypes funded this year will go into production this year and will be in experimentation for the foreseeable future.
• Sea Hunter is listed for experimentation for the foreseeable future.
• Medium USV is in design, fabrication and testing through 2022, then it will be looking for missions.
• MCM USV, better known as CUSV, is in testing and initial production through the beginning of 2021 and should be in full rate production by the middle of next year.
• The CUSV should be ready for single-sortie mine hunting by the middle of 2024, according to the slide.

And that's it!

The Hotwash

We’ll just hop right into the links tonight.

More Reading

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Germany’s $6.7 billion frigate deal with Dutch shipbuilder Damen may be the last of its kind

Entire Navy Tomahawk Missile Arsenal Will Upgrade To Block V

Awfully specific: Navy Striving for 71% On-Time Ship Maintenance This Year, No Extensions By End of 2021

Marine Commandant: ‘The Farther You Back Away From China, They Will Move Toward You’

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The surface Navy needs to fundamentally reshape itself to defeat the Chinese threat, study finds