US ship repairers meet with Sec Nav to discuss improving the US Navy’s surface ship repair programmes
The US’s Sec Nav met with leading US ship repair yard executive in the Pentagon in March to improve delivery times for scheduled repairs to the USN surface fleet (Source: BAE Systems)
In a move to try to improve the re-delivery times of US Navy’s surface fleet, including Military Sealift Command (MSC) vessels, being repaired at US commercial ship repair yards from scheduled refits, the Secretary of the Navy (Sec Nav), Carlos del Toro met with senior executives from the major US shiprepair yards at the Pentagon on March 18th for a round-table discussion focused on surface ship repair and modernisation issues.
USN and MSC leaders have expressed that repair process improvements are critical to meeting the needs of worldwide combat commanders.
In addition to Sec Nav, nearly a dozen Government representatives attended the meeting, including leaders across the USN, USMC, USCG and MarAd.
Participants discussed issues including maintenance e delay days, contract award timelines, repair yard efficiencies, performance to plan initiatives, maritime training programmes, and the impact of a fiscally constrained environment.
Discussions further revolved around recent successes in surface ship maintenance and modernisation, and collaboration on ideas for continued improvement. For example, 41% of Chief of Naval Operation’s maintenance availabilities were completed on time in fiscal year 2023, up from 37% in FY22.
The number of maintenance delay days decreased over the same period -2,136 in FY23, down from 2,483 in FY22.
