Environment Infrastructure News

Huntington Ingalls Industries' (HII) Ingalls Shipbuilding division has delivered the composite deckhouse for the destroyer Michael Monsoor (DDG 1001) to the U.S. Navy. The 900-ton deckhouse provides an advanced structure that will house the ship's bridge, radars, antennae and intake/exhaust systems and is designed to provide a significantly smaller radar cross-section than any other ship in today's fleet. "This is a very unique structure for a very unique ship," said Kevin Amis, program director, DDG 1000 Program.

Improving and updating Arctic design standards for material, equipment, and offshore structures for the petroleum, petrochemical and natural gas industries. Seventy representatives from seven countries met for two days in St. John’s, Newfoundland and Labrador in early October to further the creation of standards for resource development in the Arctic. The countries represented included Canada, UK, France, Italy, Norway, Netherlands, and Russian Federation. It was the third annual…

The need for a comprehensive and risk-aware understanding of Arctic dynamics before proceding with development is emphasised in a recent research paper. The melting of the Arctic is expected to offer prospects for maritime transport and hydrocarbon exploitation that could potentially create an Arctic economic boom. In principle, more accessible Arctic sea routes could offer substantial savings in logistics between Asian, American and European markets when compared to the current global maritime trade routes via the Panama and Suez Canals. It is estimated that as much as 13 per cent of undiscovered oil deposits and 30 per cent of undiscovered gas deposits on the globe are located in the Arctic area.

Raytheon awarded US Navy contract to extend open architecture combat system deployment and fleet support. Raytheon Company has been awarded a $22.5 million U.S. Navy contract for the Ship Self-Defense System. With this award, Raytheon will continue system development, test and integration, as well as Platform Systems Engineering Agent (PSEA) services and support for fleet-deployed systems. SSDS is an open, distributed combat management system in service on carriers and amphibious ships, including CVN, LSD dock landing ship, LPD, LHA and LHD classes. The LHA variant is nearing initial deployment, a technical refresh of the LSD-class is almost complete, and system development is underway for the new CVN 78-class of aircraft carriers.

Huntington Ingalls Industries Shipbuilding delivers the 900-ton deckhouse structure to house the ship's bridge, radars, antennas & intake/exhaust systems. The deckhouse is designed to provide a significantly smaller radar cross-section than any other ship in today's fleet. Ingalls is building the composite deckhouse and hangar for the DDG 1000 class at the company's Composite Center of Excellence in Gulfport. Made almost exclusively using cored composite construction processes, the deckhouse and hangar take full advantage of the properties of carbon fiber materials and balsa wood cores.

The U.S. Navy awarded General Dynamics Bath Iron Works a $38.9m modification to a previously awarded contract to perform class and engineering services associated with the detail design and construction of DDG 1000 Zumwalt-class ships. Bath Iron Works will continue to provide manufacturing support services such as engineering, design, production control, accuracy control and information technology. Other class-support efforts include program management, contract and financial management, procurement and configuration/data management. The original contract was awarded in September 2011. Work is expected to be completed by October 2013.

On November 17, 2011, General Dynamics Bath Iron Works celebrated the keel laying of Zumwalt (DDG 1000), the first ship in the planned three-ship Zumwalt class of guided-missile destroyers. The keel unit is the 4,000-ton, heavily outfitted mid-forebody section of the ship, which was moved from the shipyard’s Ultra Hall construction facility onto the building ways in late October. The ship is named for ADM Elmo Zumwalt (1920-2000), regarded as the father of the modern Navy. He…

On Saturday, October 22, the shipbuilders of General Dynamics Bath Iron Works, a subsidiary of General Dynamics (NYSE: GD), completed the largest and most complex ship module movement ever executed at the shipyard. The mid-forebody section of Zumwalt, the lead ship of the DDG-1000 class of guided missile destroyers, was transported 900 feet from its assembly position inside the shipyard’s Ultra Hall construction facility to the largest of the company’s three shipbuilding ways. The heavily outfitted module is about 180 feet long, over 60 feet high and weighs more than 4,000 tons.

The U. S. Navy has awarded General Dynamics Bath Iron Works, a subsidiary of General Dynamics (NYSE: GD), a $1.8 billion contract for the construction of DDG 1001 and DDG 1002, the next two ships in the Zumwalt-class program. DDG 1001 is scheduled to be delivered in December 2015 and DDG 1002 is scheduled to be delivered in February 2018. "This contract enables us to maintain a strong base of quality shipbuilding jobs in Maine and continue our contributions to sustaining the U.S. Navy fleet," said Jeff Geiger, president of Bath Iron Works.

Raytheon Systems Co., Integrated Defense Systems, Tewksbury, Mass., is being awarded a not to exceed $994,300,000 cost-type modification to previously awarded contract N00024-05-C-5346, for DDG 1000 and DDG 1001 mission system equipment (MSE) production and engineering support services. The MSE is being developed as part of the DDG 1000 ship systems detailed design and integration effort. The MSE includes the following: total ship's computing environment infrastructure; acoustic sensor suite element – including the bow array sensor suite; dual band radar; electro-optic/infrared sensor; ship control system; identification of friend or foe; common array power and cooling systems; electronic module enclosures; and Mark 57 vertical launcher system.

ST. LOUIS - The U.S. Coast Guard announced the formation of a Maritime Recovery and Restoration Task Force here to assist incident commanders engaged in Hurricane Katrina relief efforts. The task force, headed by Rear Adm. Larry Hereth, will identify maritime issues affecting people, the environment, infrastructure and the economy. By working in concert with local, state and federal partners as well as maritime industry and other stakeholders, the task force will be able to identify those actions necessary for the short-term recovery and long-term restoration of the Maritime Transportation System (MTS). The task force uses a variety of measurements to quantify the short-term recovery rate for the MTS while also identifying actions needed for long-term restoration of the MTS.