VIRGINIA CLASS - USS VERMONT

ATLANTIS STORY MAP & OPERATION HOMEPAGE

THE VIRGINIA CLASS SUBMARINE

The Virginia class, or the SSN-774 class, is the newest class of nuclear-powered cruise missile fast attack submarines in service with the United States Navy. The class is designed for a broad spectrum of open-ocean and littoral missions, including anti-submarine warfare and intelligence gathering operations. They are scheduled to replace older Los Angeles-class submarines, many of which have already been decommissioned. Virginia-class submarines will be acquired through 2043, and are expected to remain in service until at least 2060, with later submarines expected to operate into the 2070s.

On 14 March 2023, the trilateral Australian-British-American security pact known as AUKUS announced that the Royal Australian Navy would purchase three Virginia-class submarines as a stopgap measure between the retirement of their conventionally powered Collins-class submarines and the acquisition of the future SSN-AUKUS class submarines. If the SSN-AUKUS fell behind schedule, Australia would have the option of purchasing two additional Virginia-class submarines.

SPECIFICATIONS

- Builders: General Dynamics Electric Boat and HII Newport News Shipbuilding

- Length: 377 ft (114.91 m) [Block V: 460 ft (140.2 m)]

- Beam: 34 ft (10.36 m)

- Displacement: 7,800 long tons (7,900 t) [Block V: 10,200 long tons (10,400 t) 

- Payload: 40 weapons, special operations forces, unmanned undersea vehicles, Advanced SEAL Delivery System (ASDS) [Block V: 40 Tomahawk cruise missiles]

- Propulsion: S9G nuclear reactor delivering 40,000 shaft horsepower (30 MW). Nuclear core life estimated at 33 years. Nuclear fuel manufactured by BWX Technologies.

- Test depth: greater than 800 ft (240 m), allegedly around 1,600 feet (490 m).

- Speed: Greater than 25 knots (46 km/h; 29 mph), allegedly up to 35 knots (65 km/h; 40 mph)

- Planned cost: about US$1.65 billion each (based on FY95 dollars, 30-boat class and two boat/year build-rate)

- Actual cost: US$1.5 billion (in 1994 prices), US$2.6 billion (in 2012 prices)

- Annual operating cost: $50 million per unit (in 2012 prices)

- Crew: 120 enlisted and 14 officers

- Armament: 12 VLS & four torpedo tubes, capable of launching Mark 48 torpedoes, UGM-109 Tactical Tomahawk missiles, Harpoon missiles and the new advanced mobile mine when it becomes available. Block V boats will have the additional VPM module which contains four large diameter tubes which can accommodate seven Tomahawk cruise missiles each. This would increase the total number of torpedo-sized weapons (such as Tomahawks) carried by the Virginia-class design from about 37 to about 65 - an increase of about 76%.

- Decoys: Acoustic Device Countermeasure Mk 3/4

HISTORY

The class was developed under the codename Centurion, later renamed New SSN (NSSN). The "Centurion Study" was initiated in February 1991. The Virginia-class submarine was the first US Navy warship with its development coordinated using such 3D visualization technology as CATIA, which comprises computer-aided engineering (CAE), computer-aided design (CAD), computer-aided manufacturing (CAM), and product lifecycle management (PLM). Design problems for Electric Boat—and maintenance problems for the Navy—ensued nonetheless.

By 2007 approximately 35 million labor hours had been spent to design the Virginia class. Constructing a single Virginia-class submarine has required around nine million labor hours, and over 4,000 suppliers. Each submarine is projected to make 14–15 deployments during its 33-year service life.

The Virginia class was intended in part as a less expensive alternative to the Seawolf-class submarine ($1.8 billion vs $2.8 billion), whose production run was canceled after just three boats had been completed. To reduce costs, the Virginia-class submarines use many "commercial off-the-shelf" (COTS) components, especially in their computers and data networks. Improvements in shipbuilding technology have trimmed production costs below the $1.8 billion projected fiscal year 2009 dollars.

In hearings before both House of Representatives and Senate committees, the Congressional Research Service (CRS) and expert witnesses testified that the annual procurement rate of only one Virginia-class boat—rising to two in 2012—would result in excessive unit production costs, yet an insufficient complement of attack submarines.[27] In a 10 March 2005 statement to the House Armed Services Committee, Ronald O'Rourke of the CRS testified that, assuming that the production rate remains as planned, "production economies of scale for submarines would continue to remain limited or poor."

In 2001, Newport News Shipbuilding and the General Dynamics Electric Boat Company built a quarter-scale version of a Virginia-class submarine dubbed Large Scale Vehicle II (LSV II) Cutthroat. The vehicle was designed as an affordable test platform for new technologies.

The Virginia class is built through an industrial arrangement designed to maintain both GD Electric Boat and Newport News Shipbuilding, the only two U.S. shipyards capable of building nuclear-powered submarines. Under the present arrangement, the Newport News facility builds the stern, habitability, machinery spaces, torpedo room, sail, and bow, while Electric Boat builds the engine room and control room. The facilities alternate work on the reactor plant as well as the final assembly, test, outfit, and delivery.

O'Rourke wrote in 2004 that, "Compared to a one-yard strategy, approaches involving two yards may be more expensive but offer potential offsetting benefits." Among the claims of "offsetting benefits" that O'Rourke attributes to supporters of a two-facility construction arrangement is that it "would permit the United States to continue building submarines at one yard even if the other yard is rendered incapable of building submarines permanently or for a sustained period of time by a catastrophic event of some kind", including an enemy attack.

In order to get the submarine's price down to $2 billion per submarine in FY-05 dollars, the Navy instituted a cost-reduction program to shave off approximately $400 million of each submarine's price tag. The project was dubbed "2 for 4 in 12," referring to the Navy's desire to buy two boats for $4 billion in FY-12. Under pressure from Congress, the Navy opted to start buying two boats per year in FY-11, meaning that officials would not be able to get the $2 billion price tag before the service started buying two submarines per year. However, program manager Dave Johnson said at a conference on 19 March 2008 that the program was only $30 million away from achieving the $2 billion price goal, and would reach that target on schedule.

The Virginia-class Program Office received the David Packard Excellence in Acquisition Award in 1996, 1998, 2008, "for excelling in four specific award criteria: reducing life-cycle costs; making the acquisition system more efficient, responsive, and timely; integrating defense with the commercial base and practices; and promoting continuous improvement of the acquisition process".

In December 2008, the Navy signed a $14 billion contract with General Dynamics and Northrop Grumman to supply eight submarines. The contract required the delivery of one submarine in each of fiscal 2009 and 2010, and two submarines on each of fiscal 2011, 2012, and 2013. This contract was designed to bring the Navy's Virginia-class fleet to 18 submarines. In December 2010, the United States Congress passed a defense authorization bill that expanded production to two subs per year. Two submarine-per-year production resumed on 2 September 2011 with commencement of Washington (SSN-787) construction.

On 21 June 2008, the Navy christened USS New Hampshire, the first Block II submarine. This boat was delivered eight months ahead of schedule and $54 million under budget. Block II boats are built in four sections, compared to the ten sections of the Block I boats. This enables a cost saving of about $300 million per boat, reducing the overall cost to $2 billion per boat and the construction of two new boats per year. Beginning in 2010, new submarines of this class were to have included a software system that can monitor and reduce their electromagnetic signatures when needed.

The first full-duration six-month deployment was successfully carried out from 15 October 2009 to 13 April 2010. Authorization of full-rate production and the declaration of full operational capability was achieved five months later. In September 2010, it was found that urethane tiles, applied to the hull to damp internal sound and absorb rather than reflect sonar pulses, were falling off while the subs were at sea. Admiral Kevin McCoy announced that the problems with the Mold-in-Place Special Hull Treatment for the early subs had been fixed in 2011, then Minnesota was built and found to have the same problem.

In 2013, just as two-per-year sub construction was supposed to commence, Congress failed to resolve the United States fiscal cliff, forcing the Navy to attempt to "de-obligate" construction funds.

In April 2019, the CRS reported that the Navy estimated the cost of a boat was $2.8 billion. In July 2023, the CRS reported that the Navy estimates at the present production rate of two boats per year that the cost per boat when equipped with the additional Virginia Payload Module (VPM) mid-body section was $4.3 billion.

On 14 September 2023, at a Senate confirmation hearing, Admiral Lisa Franchetti said that the US Navy would have to work with builders to raise the rate of production from 1.2/year to 2.2/year to meet the AUKUS target.

SUBMARINE INDEX

Alvin DSV - Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution

AUKUS - Trilateral nuclear proliferation submarine pact, Australia, UK, US

HMS Astute 1st of Class BAE Systems

HMS Vanguard- Trident

INS Sindhurakshak - explosion & sinking

Lusitania - Torpedo attack

Nuclear PWR reactors for submarines

Nuclear powered submarines lost at sea

Predator - Covert submarine hunter/killer

Seawolf - Autonomous wolf pack deployment of Predator mini-subs

SSN Neptune - Astute class nuclear submarines

Torpedoes - UUV anti submarine weapons

U20 - Kapitan Lieutenant Walther Schwieger

U530 & U997 - Kriegsmarine Unterseeboots WWII

U534 - U-Boat sunk near Anholt, Denmark 1945, raised (no gold)

U986 - U-Boat declared missing in 20 April 1944 VIIC

USS Bluefish WWI submarine

USS Bluefish - Nuclear submarine

USS Flying Fish - Nuclear sub

USS Jimmy Carter - Seawolf class fast attack nuclear submarine

USS Nautilus - 1st nuclear submarine & subsea north pole passage

USS Scorpion - Skipjack class submarine 99 crew lost at sea

USS Vermont - Virginia Class attack submarine USA

AIRCRAFT CARRIER INDEX

Cavour - Italy

Chakri Naruebet - Thailand

Clemenceau - France

Dokdo - Republic Korea

Gerald Ford Class - USA

Hyuga - Japan

Invincible - UK

Kuznetsov - Russia

Liaoning - China

Nimitz - USA

Principe de Asturias - Spain

Queen Elizabeth - UK

Vikrant Class - India

WARSHIPS

Bismarck - Battleship - Germany

HMS Neptune - Leander class cruiser 1941 WWII

Type 23 - Duke class frigate - UK

Type 26 - Global combat ship - UK

Type 45 - Daring class destroyer - UK

Electric prototype - USA

Zumwalt - Class destroyer - USA

CHARACTERS | GOLD | MEDIA | MOVIES | SCREENPLAY | SUBMARINES

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In this fictional story, the characters and events are the product of the author's imagination.