March 9, 2024:
The U.S. Navy has finally started repair work on an SSN (nuclear attack submarine) that returned damaged from its last time at sea nine years ago. The Newport News Shipbuilding firm is to carry out a $1.24 billion overhaul of Los Angeles-class submarine USS Boise at a shipyard in Virginia. The work will be completed by 2029.
The work includes maintenance and restoration of hull structure, tanks, propulsion systems, electric plant, auxiliary systems, armament, and furnishings in addition to many useful alterations.
The delays in doing the work on the USS Boise were caused by submarine maintenance backlogs resulting from not enough shipyards. The Boise was originally supposed to have this work done in 2016, but for eight years there were not enough shipyards available to do the work.
SSNs have lower maintenance priority than SSBNs (nuclear-powered ballistic missile submarines) and aircraft carriers. If repairs on SSBNs and carriers take longer, the SSNs have to wait. USS Bosie was idle at the Naval Station Norfolk so long that it eventually lost its dive certification in 2017. That meant any repairs and maintenance had to be followed by extensive efforts to certify that the SSN was capable of operating effectively and capable of submerging safely.
To deal with these delays the Navy considered using a new private construction yard to do some of the repair work the public yards were not available for. The USS Boise moved to a dry dock at Newport News in 2020 as part of a contract to determine the scope of work needed to repair the submarine. While shifting to private yard maintenance relieved some pressure on the workload, repairs at those yards took longer than expected and were more expensive as well.
HHI or Huntington Ingalls Industries, which builds new ships and repairs ships already in service, can also do some repairs on SSNs and SSBNs. HII delivered its first repaired SSN, USS Helena in early 2022. A second SSN, USS Columbus is due to complete its repairs and maintenance by 2025.
U.S. Navy efforts to deal with the maintenance backlog was complicated by the fact that so much work had to be done on older Los Angeles-class SSN that entered service at the rate of three to four per year in the late 1980s and 1990s. Only 26 of the original 62 Los Angeles class subs are still in service and some need maintenance to remain operational. The new Virginia class SSNs are still being built but only 23 of the eventual 66 Virginians are active. This means the navy currently has 49 SSNs available versus their goal of at least 66 SSNs in active service.
The shortage of shipyards for maintenance of all ships, especially carriers and their escorts as well as amphibious operations ships, means the SSNs are unlikely to ever have enough access to maintenance facilities to maintain their numbers. The government does not want to pay for more shipyards because the government already pays to maintain, but does not do major work to upgrade, existing government shipyards. There are two on the east coast and two on the west coast, one of them in Hawaii. The Navy and government do not receive enough money to upgrade their shipyards as well as build new ships. The cost of new ships has gone up and the navy cannot afford to buy all they need while also keeping the government shipyards in shape to deal with the growing backlog of ship maintenance. It’s a money problem and Congress cannot muster sufficient support to appropriate the needed money. This is complicated by the growth of the Chinese navy. The Chinese can build new warships faster and more cheaply than the United States. That is mainly because China is currently the largest builder of commercial shipping. A lot more commercial ships are needed and there is price competition that keeps the prices under control. These price controls extended to the more complex warships with their additional weapons and electronic systems commercial ships lack.
The Chinese Navy currently has more ships than the U.S. Navy but in terms of tonnage the Americans are still ahead. The U.S. has more nuclear submarines, both SSNs and SSBNs and a lot more experience at maintaining ships at sea and conducting combat operations. Chinese admirals understand this and are trying t0 build carriers that can match eleven nuclear powered carriers the Americans currently have. China has been seeking weapons that can destroy or disable the American carriers as well as ways to deal with all those SSNs and SSBNs. So far, the Chinese have not come up with a reliable method to endanger the Americans carrier and submarine supremacy. Currently the larger number of Chinese warships provides more targets for American subs and carriers and not enough threat to those subs and carriers. The Chinese Navy has another problem because their government will not provide the money needed to maintain and further expand the Chinese fleet because the Chinese economy is having problems. For the government, the economy, and efforts to keep the number of unemployed Chinese low, is more important than a large or more effective navy. As long as China is unable or unwilling to spend what it takes to develop a real threat to the Americans SSN and SSBN force, the American threat to Chinese naval supremacy remains present and unassailable.
