LCS-3 Needs Months to Return to US, Months for Repairs

(Source: U.S. Pacific Fleet; issued April 13, 2016)

PEARL HARBOR --- The Littoral Combat Ship USS Fort Worth (LCS 3) will make preparations to get underway from Singapore on its own power and transit to San Diego this summer.

Fort Worth experienced an engineering casualty to the ship's combining gears January in Singapore that will require an extensive repair period.

Preparations are expected to take several months to complete necessary inspections, conduct lube oil system flushes, and configure the engineering plant for safe operations.

The ship will use its gas turbine engines to transit from its current location in Singapore where it has been rotationally deployed since December 2014. The Pacific Ocean transit to homeport in San Diego is expected to take about six weeks with several underway replenishments and planned fueling stops along the way.

The decision to complete full repair of Fort Worth's combining gears in San Diego was based on several factors, including maintenance timelines, efficiency of repairs, and shipyard capabilities. Repairs will be conducted during Fort Worth's previously scheduled selected restricted availability with docking (SRA(d)) maintenance period, reducing the overall cost to the Navy. It has yet to be determined whether the SRA(d) duration will be extended due to the combining gear repair work.

As Fort Worth demonstrated through continuous operations in 2015, Littoral Combat Ships provide an important capability in the Indo-Asia-Pacific region and planning continues for future LCS deployments.

(EDITOR’S NOTE: Tt seems clear that there is something seriously wrong with the USS Fort Worth, despite the pedestrian wording of the above statement.

The fact that its commanding officer was relieved in March “due to loss of confidence in Atwell’s ability to command,” reportedly because he failed to properly maintain the propulsion system, whose failure in January effectively immobilized the ship in Singapore, where it is forward-deployed.
The fact that it will take two months to prepare the ship for its June departure from Singapore, that the voyage to San Diego will take six weeks, and that the repairs will take several months suggest that the failure is more important than implied by the Navy.
This is another blow for the Lockheed Martin LCS design which, unlike to the other LCS trimaran design by Austal, has suffered from a number of technical faults and spectacular cost overruns.)

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