Northrop Grumman Corporation's Shipbuilding facility has achieved an important milestone by loading 100,000 gallons of fuel aboard the company's sixth San Antonio-class ship on Oct. 2. The loading of fuel is extremely important as the shipbuilders prepare to light the ship's first generator and later send the ship to sea for its first sea trial.
"We are dedicated to first time quality and meeting our program commitments. The shipbuilders working on our company's sixth LPD have accomplished this task," said Phil Lechner, construction manager, San Diego (LPD 22). "It was a complete team effort for our talented workforce to prepare all of the machinery spaces for this fuel load. This is a very important milestone in the construction life of the ship as we maintain our schedule commitments with our Navy customer."
In the construction of any U.S. Navy ship, the importance of getting the ship's spaces together to load fuel is extremely critical to keep the ship's construction on schedule, specifically the generator light off. The generator light off for LPD 22 is scheduled for next month.
"Shipbuilders on San Diego prepared all main machinery spaces to load the first 100,000 gallons of fuel," said Mark Pettey, ship superintendent, LPD 22."The first fuel will help flush the fuel system ahead of the upcoming generator light off. It has been a tremendous effort from all crafts to make this event successful."
San Diego was christened in June and is scheduled for sea trials in the second quarter of 2010.