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The US Navy plans to reopen four dry docks for submarine repairs located at shipyards in Washington State. This is reported by the military analytical magazine Defense News. The first dock will start working in April, the second — in May, and the third is planned to start using in June this year.
The Navy Command suspended the operation of the fourth, fifth and sixth dry docks at the Puget Sound Naval Shipyard and the dry dock at the Trident plant repair facility in Bangor at the end of January this year. The reason was called the poor readiness of shipyards even for minor seismic shocks.
At a congressional hearing on Tuesday, the chief of Naval Operations, Admiral Mike Gilday, said that the most extensive work on the reconstruction of the dock is being carried out at the Bangor shipyard, where the Ohio-class ballistic missile submarines are serviced and repaired. According to him, they should be completed in June this year.
At the Puget Sound Naval Shipyard, where aircraft carriers and attack submarines are being repaired and modernized, work is being carried out on dry dock sites, next to which nuclear reactors of submarines will be located. According to the admiral, the reconstruction of one dock should be completed in April, the other in May. Gilday did not say when the fourth dock will be launched.
The Navy requested an additional $300 million from Congress in excess of the approved budget to carry out work to strengthen the seismic resistance of four docks.
Gilday told congressmen that the Navy Command plans to conduct a survey of other docks in the Pacific Northwest to eliminate seismic vulnerability. The work has just begun and it is too early to talk about the timing of their implementation and the amount of funding necessary for this, the admiral added.
