Taking a Toll
By AMY L. WITTMAN, Editor in Chief
In the $613.9 bil- lion defense budget proposal President
Barack Obama sent
to Congress on Feb.
13, $208.8 billion
has been proposed
for operations and
maintenance depart-ment-wide. Of that,
the Navy and Marine
Corps would get a
total of $59.5 billion, which includes Overseas Contingency Operations funds, according to a budget
documents.
Maintenance can be daunting in
a maritime environment, its effects
taking a toll on billions of dollars
worth of equipment and making
ships, aircraft and vehicles increasingly expensive to operate and less
safe for the operators.
The Navy spends an estimated $7
billion just to combat corrosion and,
as Special Correspondent Daniel P.
Taylor points out in his report,
“Fighting the Silent Enemy” (page
22), the actual cost may be higher.
“It doesn’t look at mission systems, it
doesn’t look at up-front investments,
trade studies, things like that,” says
Stephen Spadafora, the Navy’s corro-
sion control and prevention execu-
tive. “So that $7 billion is essentially
a low figure.”
To address the issue, the Navy has
launched a multi-agency effort aimed
at not just fixing the damage caused
by corrosion, but addressing the
potential problems as early as the sys-
tem design phase.
Special Correspondent Edward
Lundquist explores ways to keep
ships out of dry dock and extend hull
life in “A Maintenance-Free Hull?”
(page 18). The Office
of Naval Research is
studying the use of
materials other than
iron and steel in ship
construction to lessen
the impact of corro-
sion, such as alumi-
num, composites and
titanium. Larry Schu-
ette, director for inno-
vation with the Office
of Naval Research, notes that “in
terms of ship design and production,
maintenance, protection and surviv-
ability, we’re trying to build things
that last longer.”
In “Sleek Exterior, Trouble Inside”
(page 24), Taylor recounts the prob-
lems encountered in executing the
LPD 17 program that some have said
is indicative of a lack of focus on ship
maintenance and shipbuilding over-
sight fleetwide. Doug Lounsberry,
Huntington Ingalls Industries’ vice
president and LPD 17 program man-
ager, said various communities with-
in the Navy and the shipbuilder had
to come together to get to the heart of
the program’s problems.
Rounding out our special report
on Maintenance, Repair & Overhaul, Managing Editor Richard R.
Burgess, in “Branching Out” (page
28), notes that independent naval
engineering firm Gibbs & Cox has
expanded its work to include offering sustainment and support services to shipyards too small to have
their own engineers on site, and to
the U.S. government in support of
ships sold to other countries.
SEAPOWER
THE OFFICIAL PUBLICATION OF THE
NAVY LEAGUE OF THE UNITED STATES
Volume 55, Number 3, March 2012
PUBLISHER
Philip L. Dunmire
ASSOCIATE PUBLISHER
Dale A. Lumme
EDITOR IN CHIEF
Amy L. Wittman
awittman@navyleague.org
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Peter E. Atkinson
patkinson@navyleague.org
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Richard R. Burgess
rburgess@navyleague.org
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jmarcario@navyleague.org
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