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The USS Gerald R. Ford, a huge new aircraft carrier, reached a milestone in its pricey and extensive construction Thursday when its final keel section was lowered into place at Newport News Shipbuilding in Virginia. The 680-metric-ton lower bow unit is one of the largest of the 500 modules that will make up the completed ship and is over 60-feet-tall. The bulbous bow seen in the picture shifts water flow around the hull, reducing drag and thus increasing speed, range, fuel efficiency, and stability. Carriers with bulbous bows have achieve about 12 to 15 percent increased fuel efficiency than vessels...

Navy Secretary Ray Mabus confirmed Thursday that the cost overrun for the aircraft carrier USS Gerald R. Ford is projected to reach $1 billion, bringing the ship’s total cost to some $12 billion — but said it’s on track to be delivered on schedule. The admission took place under questioning from Arizona Sen. John McCain, the ranking Republican on the Senate Armed Services Committee, who pointedly asked Mabus “what have you been doing on your watch” to control the costs on the new ship. Mabus said the Navy’s deal with shipbuilder Huntington-Ingalls Industries is such that the government has “recovered...

The first in the Navy’s new class of supercarriers is likely to end up costing a lot more than anticipated: The U.S. Navy has estimated a worst-case cost overrun of as much as $1.1 billion for the aircraft carrier USS Gerald R. Ford, the service’s most expensive warship. The carrier is being built by Huntington Ingalls Industries under a cost-plus, incentive-fee contract in which the Navy pays for most of the overruns. Even so, the service’s efforts to control expenses may put the company’s $579.2 million profit at risk, according to the Navy. A review of the carrier’s rising costs...

The Navy made history Saturday when it launched the first aircraft from the Naval Air Systems Command, Lakehurst, N.J., test site using the Electromagnetic Aircraft Launch System, or EMALS, technology. The Navy has been using steam for more than 50 years to launch aircraft from carriers. Saturday, the Aircraft Launch and Recovery Equipment (ALRE) program launched an F/A-18E Super Hornet using the EMALS technology that will replace steam catapults on future aircraft carriers. “This is a tremendous achievement not just for the ALRE team, but for the entire Navy,” said Capt. James Donnelly, ALRE program manager. “Saturday’s EMALS launch demonstrates...

Northrop Grumman has received a $189.2 million contract modification to continue design of a new aircraft carrier for the U.S. Navy. The USS Gerald R. Ford (CVN 78) is the first ship of the Gerald R. Ford class whose keel was laid Nov. 14, 2009. Enhancements incorporated into the design of the ship include flight deck changes, improved weapons handling systems and a redesigned island, all resulting in increased aircraft sortie rates.

Recent tests at NAS Lakehurst, N.J., should have builders of the USS Gerald R. Ford (CVN-78) sleeping more easily. The Navy’s risky bet in the design of the Ford—its reliance on an all-electric replacement for the steam catapult—appears to be paying off. Problems and delays with the electromagnetic aircraft launch system (Emals) last year were a threat to the carrier, because its design and construction reached a point where reverting to steam would have been difficult and expensive. With Emals in mind, the Ford-class features a much more powerful electrical generation and distribution system than the predecessor Nimitz-class ships, along...

Radical plans by the US Navy to equip its next aircraft carrier with electromagnetic mass-drivers for launching aircraft instead of the traditional steam catapults have hit technical snags. The so-called Electromagnetic Aircraft Launch System, or EMALS, is now under development in a shore-based test facility at Lakehurst naval air station in New Jersey. However, according to reports, the test mass-driver installation suffered serious damage earlier this year in a mishap blamed on a "software malfunction". Apparently the "shuttle" - which moves along the catapult track to accelerate a plane to flying speed - went the wrong way in a test...

The Navy will name its next aircraft carrier USS Gerald R. Ford in honor of the president who was buried Wednesday in his home town of Grand Rapids, Mich., officials said. The Navy had not planned to make the announcement yet, but Donald H. Rumsfeld, the former defense secretary who served in the Ford administration, divulged the news during his eulogy at the funeral. "How fitting it would be that the name Gerald R. Ford will patrol the high seas for decades to come in defense of the nation he loved so much," he said. Later at the Pentagon the...