US Navy Underestimates Sustainment Costs For 6 New Ships By $130Bln - Report

WASHINGTON (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 24th March, 2020) Keeping six of the newest US Navy ships operational will cost $130 billion more than planned due to systemic maintenance problems such unscheduled engine repairs and clogged toilets on the two aircraft carriers, the General Accountability Office (GAO) said in a report on Tuesday.

Applying the same metrics to warships built during the past decade, GAO said the failure of Navy shipbuilding programs to identify, evaluate and mitigate sustainment risks during the acquisition process would cost the US $4.2 billion to correct just the 30 percent of these problems identified in the report.

"We investigated every class of ships the Navy recently built and found 150 examples of systemic maintenance problems. Sailors showed us things like failed engines, faulty electronics and clogged toilets," the report said. "For six shipbuilding programs whose costs GAO could assess, the Navy had underestimated sustainment costs by $130 billion.

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A brand new toilet and sewage system on the Navy's two new aircraft carriers, the Gerald R. Ford and George H. W. Bush, provided a stark illustration of maintenance woes detailed in the report.

After the toilets were installed, the Navy determined that the systems required periodic acid flushes to keep waste from backing up.

"According to fleet maintenance officials, while each acid flush costs about $400,000, the Navy has yet to determine how often and for how many ships this action will need to be repeated, making the full cost impact difficult to quantify," the report said.

As a result, the GAO said it could not include aircraft carrier toilet expenses in its overall estimates of maintenance cost overruns, according to the report.