U.S. Navy’s final Nimitz-class aircraft carrier USS George H.W. Bush was launched on this day, January 10, at the Newport News shipyard, Virginia. The 332-meter-long, nuclear-powered ship was laid down on May 19, 2003 and launched on October 9, 2006 with Dorothy W.B. Koch, daughter of President Bush
The French defense procurement agency DGA contracted Safran Electronics & Defense to developed an improved version of its global navigation system that is used on the country’s Triomphant class ballistic missile nuclear submarines. In a announcement on Monday, the company said the new version capita
Responding to challenges from ‘near-peer’ competitors, the U.S. Navy has released a new surface force strategy under which it will strengthen its naval power at and from the sea. The objective of the strategy is to achieve and sustain sea control which the navy sees as a pre-requisite to achieving t
The U.S. Navy has awarded BAE Systems Norfolk Ship Repair a $75.1 million contract for USS San Antonio (LPD 17) fiscal 2017 docking phased maintenance availability (DMPA). According to the U.S. Department of Defense, this availability will include a combination of maintenance, modernization, and rep
The U.S. Navy accepted its 50th P-8A Poseidon (P-8A) maritime, patrol and reconnaissance aircraft at the Naval Air Station (NAS) Jacksonville, Florida on January 5. The Navy’s Poseidon is replacing the legacy P-3 Orion and will improve an operator’s ability to efficiently conduct anti-submarine warf
The UK government is setting aside £30 milion for the development of a laser weapon prototype that is to be developed under the Laser Directed Energy Weapons (DEW) capability demonstrator. After several months of preparations, the UK Ministry of Defense on Wednesday officially awarded the contract t
Royal Canadian Navy’s Halifax-class frigate HMCS St. John’s left her homeport on Wednesday and headed for the Mediterranean Sea where it will join NATO’s standing maritime group 2. Departing from the naval base in Halifax, St. John’s set sail for the operation Reassurance to replace sister ship HMCS
UK’s BMT Defence Services (BMT) joined forces with the University of Bristol to work on the development of an UAV that would be the first ever to perform a perched landing on a ship’s flight deck. The 18-month research project was delivered as part of the Defence Science and Technology Laboratory’s
The U.S. Navy awarded Cianbro Corp. a $26.9 million contract in December for construction and dock repairs at Portsmouth Naval Shipyard (PNSY) in Kittery, Maine. Under the contract, Cianbro will replace the caisson at PSNY’s dry dock number #3. The work will also provide repairs to the concrete entr
BAE Systems announced Monday it sold its San Francisco Ship Repair business to Puglia Engineering, Inc. The Washington-based ship repair company Puglia Engineering currently operates two shipyards in Washington state. “We believe this divestiture is in the best interests of the San Francisco shipyar
The U.S. Navy’s future Arleigh Burke-class destroyer USS Rafael Peralta (DDG 115) completed acceptance trials December 16 after spending two days underway off the coast of Maine. USS Rafael Peralta is the third Flight IIA Restart destroyer laid down in October 2014 and christened a year later by the
The Italian Navy’s Bergamini-class frigate ITS Carabiniere left the Italian port of La Spezia for an ‘Italian industry showcase’ deployment to Australia and Southeast Asia. ITS Carabiniere is a FREMM frigate built for the Italian Navy by Fincantieri within the framework of an Italo-French cooperatio
The Russian Navy has received a new Delta IV ballistic missile submarine ‘Podmoskovye’ after the boat spent 18 years undergoing refit and modernization at the Zvezdochka shipyard. The Project 667BDRM Delfin-class (NATO classification: Delta IV) submarine had its missile compartment removed and is no
The U.S. Naval Surface Warfare Center has awarded Lockheed Martin a $150.9 million contract for the Target Sight System (TSS) on the AH-1Z Cobra attack helicopter. The TSS is a large-aperture midwave forward-looking infrared sensor with a laser designator/rangefinder turret. The system provides the