St. LOUIS — Boeing is preparing its MQ-25 T1 unmanned aerial refueling test asset to return to flight test later this year, this time with a U.S. Navy aerial refueling store, the company said in a July 23 email. 

The store was recently integrated onto a purpose-built pylon under the wing of T1 during a planned modification. It is the same store currently carried by F/A-18 fighter jets that perform aerial refueling off aircraft carriers. MQ-25 will relieve F/A-18s of carrier-based aerial refueling, freeing up those assets to perform other missions. 

 “When we resume flight testing later this year, we’ll have the opportunity to gather test points about the aerodynamics of that pod and the software commands that control it – all happening well before we deliver the Navy’s first MQ-25 jet with the same pod,” said Dave Bujold, MQ-25 program director. “That early testing and early software development is a big part of supporting the Navy’s goal to get MQ-25 to the fleet as quickly as possible.” 

The Boeing and Navy team conducted an initial round of flight testing that began with T1’s first flight in September 2019 and resulted in nearly 30 hours in the air. Bujold said those flights helped accelerate the team’s understanding of the aircraft’s aerodynamic performance and informed design decisions for both the air vehicle and its software. 

The MQ-25 will be the U.S. Navy’s first operational, carrier-based unmanned aircraft. Boeing is under contract to manufacture seven aircraft that will subsequently go into Navy flight test. 

When T1 returns to flight with the aerial refueling store, it will be under the control of Boeing air vehicle operators and monitored by a team of flight test engineers, including those from the Navy. That team first will be looking at the aerodynamic effects of the store at various points of the flight envelope and later will be monitoring the hose and drogue’s behavior in the wake of the MQ-25 airframe. 

ARLINGTON, Va. — A U.S. Navy destroyer and maritime patrol aircraft have teamed up in the Black Sea to provide the U.S participation in the 2020 Sea Breeze annual international naval exercise.  

The Arleigh Burke-class guided-missile destroyer USS Porter, a unit of the Forward-Deployed Naval Force based in Rota, Spain, entered the Black Sea on July 19 to participate in the 20^th annual Exercise Sea Breeze, sponsored by the United States and Ukraine. The exercise runs July 20 through July 26.  

The Porter, commanded by Cmdr. Craig M. Trent, is making its eighth ballistic-missile defense patrol and third excursion into the Black Sea. The ship has been joined by a P-8A Poseidon aircraft assigned to Patrol Squadron 47 (VP-47), based at Naval Air Station Whidbey Island, Washington, and deployed to Naval Air Station Sigonella, Sicily. VP-47 is commanded by Cmdr. Trever Plageman. 

The Porter and the VP-47 aircraft are participating in exercises with ships from seven other nations: Bulgaria, Georgia, Norway, Romania, Spain, Turkey and Ukraine. Some of the ships are part of NATO Standing Maritime Group 2. 

“Sea Breeze serves to build a rock-solid foundation of partnership in the Black Sea,” Vice Adm. Gene Black, commander, U.S. 6th Fleet, said during the opening day press conference, according to a release. “Our ships, aircraft and personnel train together unified in our goal of maritime security and stability.” 

In a July 22 teleconference with reporters, Trent said the Porter conducted a search-and-rescue exercise on July 21, an air-defense exercise July 22, and is scheduled for an antisubmarine exercise on July 23. He said the ship crews in the exercise were “very capable and professional … and very willing to work with us.”   

Trent said his crew is observing strict health precautions amid the COVID-19 pandemic, preventing normal festive port calls and productive interactions with the crews of the participating foreign ships. He said that a minimal number of Sailors go ashore to assist the Porter to assist the ship in taking on fuel. 

Plageman, also speaking in the teleconference, said that no submarines are serving as targets in the exercise. The ships and aircraft will be using an Expendable Mobile ASW Training Target System to simulate a target submarine. 

Trent said the Russian navy has been present in the vicinity of the exercise but that there have been no confrontations and the Russian units have acted in a “safe and professional” manner. 

ARLINGTON, Va. — The top U.S. military official in the Indo-Pacific area of responsibility has placed 360-degree defense of Guam from air and missile threats as his top priority. 

Adm. Phillip S. Davidson, commander, U.S. Indo Pacific Command, speaking in a July 21 teleconference with reporters, said that ballistic missiles launched from China or North Korea and cruise missiles launched from aircraft, ships or submarines are a threat to U.S. forces in Guam, a U.S. territory, which is increasing in importance as a base for U.S. forces. 

“My No. 1 priority, and the most important action we can take to readily and most fully implement the National Defense Strategy, as a first step, is a 360-degree persistent integrated air defense capability of what I call Homeland Defense System Guam,” Davidson said. 

Davidson advocates deploying the Baseline 10 Aegis Ashore missile defense system to Guam to supplement the Terminal High-Altitude Area Defense, or THAAD, system already in place on the island.  

The Aegis Ashore system is an adaptation of the Navy’s Aegis Combat System installed on Ticonderoga-class guided-missile destroyers and Arleigh Burke-class guided-missile destroyers. The SPY-1D radars of the system are teamed with an array of vertical launch cells housing Standard SM-3 missiles. Two Aegis Ashore systems are deployed to Europe, in Romania and Poland.  

“The backbone of the Homeland Defense System Guam would be the Baseline 10 Aegis Ashore system,” Davidson said. “The reason I’m a key advocate for that is, first, it is technology that is available to us now and could be delivered by 2026, when I believe the threat will require us to have a much more robust capability than the combination of THAAD, which is deployed there now, and an Aegis ship in response can provide. 

“You are going to need a complete clock — a 360-degree coverage in order to help defend Guam,” he said. “Further, Aegis Ashore, the C5I [command, control, communications, computers, cyber, intelligence], that comes with it, enables you to bring in other capability like PAC-3 [missile defense system], other shorter-range defenses as well, much like Baseline 10 on a ship enables you to link and engage with other capability sets. That’s going to be required going forward. And it comes quickest. And that’s why Homeland Defense System Guam is at the top of my list.” 

Davidson said the funding would have to be approved by Congress in the 2021 budget for ground to be broken in time for Aegis Ashore to be operational in Guam by 2026.  

Guam was an important base during the Cold War and Vietnam War, with a squadron of ballistic-missile submarines, an EP-3 fleet air reconnaissance squadron and a detachment of P-3 maritime patrol aircraft, as well as an Air Force wing of B-52 long-range bombers. Its importance declined after the Cold War but returned in the 21st century to counter the rise of China’s military power. The Navy has stationed four attack submarines in Guam along with two submarine tenders. At Andersen Air Force Base, the Navy operates a sea combat helicopter squadron and a detachment of MQ-4C Triton long-endurance unmanned aerial vehicles. The Navy also is building facilities for Marine Corps units that are scheduled to be moved to Guam from Okinawa in the future.   

Japan, which also deploys the Aegis system on its Kongo-class guided-missile destroyers, also had planned to deploy Aegis Ashore, but recently canceled the deployment because of concerns of damage to local communities near the launch sites. 

U.S. Navy cruisers and destroyers forward-deployed to Japan patrol the Sea of Japan in rotation to provide ballistic-missile defense. Former Chief of Naval Operations Adm. John M. Richardson advocated for more Aegis Ashore systems to make the ships available for other tasking.   

ARLINGTON, Va. — The U.S. Navy is developing a new sonobuoy to enhance is ability to track newer and quieter submarines, according to a July 20 Defense Department contract announcement.  

The Office of Naval Research has awarded Undersea Signal Systems Inc. of Columbia City, Indiana, a $28.3 million cost-plus-fixed-fee-contract “to develop a prototype sonobuoy, known as Extended Range Directional Frequency Analysis and Recording (ER-DIFAR), to address new and quiet threat submarine targets.” 

Sonobuoys are deployed by Navy P-8A, P-3C and MH-60R aircraft to acoustically detect and track submarines. They are expendable sensors that float on the surface of the water and extend a hydrophone to depths to collect sound from submarine propulsion systems, auxiliary machinery and other sources of sound from a submarine. 

Passive sonobuoys, such as the SSQ-53 DIFAR (Directional Frequency Analysis and Recording) sonobuoys were a staple of Cold War antisubmarine operations because they were able to detect and point to the sounds from a submarine. As Soviet and later Russian submarines improved in their acoustic quieting, the DIFAR sonobuoy became less effective. The Navy then turned to emphasized active tracking sonobuoys such as the SSQ-125 sonobuoy, which used a sound source to “ping” a submarine, but also revealed to a submarine that it was being tracked.  

A new extended-range DIFAR sonobuoy would increase the ability to passively track quieter submarines.    

The contract for the DIFAR-ER is a three-year base contract with a one-year option. Work is expected to be completed by July 2024. 

ARLINGTON, Va. — The Navy has ordered six more Enterprise Air Search Radars (EASRs) from Raytheon Missiles and Defense, the Defense Department said in a July 17 release. 

The Naval Sea Systems Command has awarded Raytheon Missiles and Defense of Marlborough, Massachusetts, a $125.9 million fixed-price, incentive fee modification to a previously awarded to exercise options for the six low- rate initial production units.  

The six units include four SPY-6(V)2 rotator versions and two SPY-6(V)3 fixed-faced versions. These versions are scaled-down versions of the SPY-6(V)1 Air and Missile Defense Radar being installed on the Flight III Arleigh Burke-class guided-missile destroyers. 

The AN/SPY-6(V)2 EASR rotator units will be deployed on the amphibious assault ship USS Bougainville (LHA 8), the Nimitz-class aircraft carrier USS John C. Stennis (CVN 74), the last Flight I San Antonio-class amphibious platform dock ship USS Richard M. McCool Jr. (LPD 29) and the first Flight II San Antonio-class amphibious platform dock ship USS Harrisburg (LPD 30), respectively.   

The two SPY-6(V)3 EASR fixed-faced units will be deployed on the Gerald R. Ford-class aircraft carrier USS John F. Kennedy (CVN 79) and the first ship of the new FFG(X) guided-missile frigates.  

Work is expected to be completed by January 2023.   

ARLINGTON, Va. — As part of the national response to COVID-19, the Defense Department entered into a $22 million agreement with Rolls-Royce to maintain, protect and expand critical domestic productive capacity for propellers essential to U.S. Navy shipbuilding programs, the department said in a Jul 17 release. These projects will begin in July 2020 and help meet increasing demand across the vitally important shipbuilding sector of the defense industrial base. 

Using funds authorized and appropriated under the CARES Act, this DPA Title III investment will protect and create jobs in the Gulf Coast region hit hard by the COVID-19 pandemic and ensure critical capabilities are retained in support of U.S. Navy operational readiness. 

Rolls-Royce intends to expand its existing facility in Pascagoula, Mississippi, to install a number of state-of-the-art machine tools to support production of propellers for all shipbuilding programs, reduce production risks and increase throughput. These investments will have long-term benefits for the U.S. Navy and the Gulf Coast region.  

Over the next 36 months, the $22 million government investment will sustain and expand critical domestic industrial base capability for propeller machining capacity. The Rolls-Royce Foundry will continue to be one of only two facilities capable of supplying the U.S. Navy with this capacity. 

The Rolls-Royce Foundry in Pascagoula is the principal place of performance. 

ARLINGTON, Va. — Chief of Naval Operations Adm. Mike Gilday announced a series of investigations into the disastrous fire that severely damaged the amphibious assault ship USS Bonhomme Richard in San Diego this week. 

Following a July 17 tour of the damage aboard the ship, Gilday held a press conference in the afternoon to discuss the events and to praise the ship’s crew and the hundreds of other firefighters from other vessels and fire departments that came to the aid of the Bonhomme Richard, the sixth ship of the Wasp class. 

Gilday said there would be a safety investigation to determine the cause of the fire and any ancillary issues in the realm of safety. This investigation, to be conducted by Naval Sea Systems Command (NAVSEA), will be kept confidential to allow for free flow of testimony.  

A second investigation, also routine in such incidents, will be conducted by the Navy Criminal Investigative Service, to determine if the fire was caused by any malfeasance or criminal activity, the CNO announced. 

Gilday said the Navy also will conduct a third investigation that will look into several echelons of command to determine if the correct procedures were in effect during the emergency, if the Navy reacted properly to the fire, and if measures should have been in place that were not, among other factors. 

“Make no mistake,” the CNO said. “We will follow the facts of what happened here. We will be honest with ourselves. We will get after it as a Navy.”  

He also said the ship’s structure will be assessed, as will any mechanical and electrical damage, so the Navy can determine whether the amphib can be repaired. Experts from the ship’s builder, Huntington Ingalls Industries, will be involved in the assessment, as will those of NAVSEA and Norfolk Naval Shipyard. 

Gilday said four-star fleet commanders will send detailed messages to all ships in all fleets, mandating that within five days their commanding officers assess personnel training levels, see if equipment is adequately operable — “in terms of placement and in terms of numbers” — and to “red-team” their procedures “to make sure they’re adequate.” 

“I am 100% confident that our defense industry can put this ship back to sea, but, having said that, the question is, ‘should we make that investment in a 22-year-old ship?” he said. “I’m not going to make any predictions until we take a look at all of the facts, and we follow the facts, and we can make a reasonable recommendation on the future steps.”  

Gilday inspected the damage to the Bonhomme Richard down to four decks below the flight deck and up to the superstructure and spoke to many of the firefighters. He was told that the wind coming off the bay helped the fire spread out of control, up elevator shafts and into the ship’s exhaust stacks. 

There also were a series of explosions — one of which could be heard 13 miles away — that led the ship’s CO to withdraw firefighters for their safety. At one point, an explosion blew debris across the pier to another ship, Gilday said. 

“I think that the situation was very tenuous,” he said. “I think that the commanding officer made some very sound decisions in terms of how to attack the fire very deliberately.” 

The fires, which started on the morning of July 12, burned for four days. The amphib, which is based in San Diego, was being upgraded to operate F-35B Lightning II strike fighters, among other modernizations. 

ARLINGTON, Va. — The U.S. interests in the Arctic Ocean and its connections to the Atlantic and Pacific oceans might be better served as a dedicated fleet’s area of responsibility, rather that divided between the U.S. 2nd, 3rd and 6th Fleets, a Navy expert on the Arctic said. 

Dr. Walter Berbrick, associate professor at the Naval War College and director of its Arctic Studies Group, was speaking July 16 during a webinar, Arctic East vs West: US Strategy in the Atlantic and Pacific Arctic, sponsored by CNA, a think tank in Arlington. 

Berbrick said the lessened ice coverage of the Arctic Ocean is inviting to nations seeking to reduce maritime transit time between continents, especially considering that maritime commerce is expected to double over the next 20 years. 

The Northern Sea Route along the Russian northern shoreline cuts 40% of the transit distance between Europe and the Far East, a route of considerable interest to China. The Northwest Passage, between the Bering Strait by Alaska and the Davis Strait by Greenland, is less viable, given the shallowness of the water and the narrow straits. More attractive, should the ice melt more, is the Transpolar Route, directly across the geographic North Pole from any direction, so far navigable only by submarines. 

He said the current forecast of when the Transpolar Route might be navigable for surface ships by anywhere between 2035 and 2050 out to 2060.  

He noted that Russia is increasing its military presence in the Arctic region with modernizing old air bases, installing air-defense missile batteries, increasing submarine activity and building polar icebreakers armed with cruise missiles. 

Berbrick said the heart of China’s Arctic strategy is use of the Arctic sea routes and gaining access to ports in northern Europe for maritime commerce. He said China’s increasing naval deployments away from home waters are likely to extend to the Arctic regions eventually, including Chinese subs making transits to the North Pole.   

Regarding U.S. policy toward Arctic presence, Berbrick said the U.S. Coast Guard has done more than any other service to step up and dominate the discussion, but that this also means closer integration between the Coast Guard and U.S. Navy in the Arctic.  

“What capabilities do we need to deter and, if necessary, to respond to any military by any nation or navy?” Berbrick asked rhetorically. “What forces do we need to assure our allies and partners in the region? How do we posture our forces to keep Arctic sea lines of communication free and open? What kind of naval power do we need [in the region] project from the Arctic to potentially gain an advantage in other places like the Pacific and the Atlantic?” 

He noted that the U.S. Navy is designed for high-end fighting in warm waters. 

The Navy also would need days or weeks to respond to a crisis in the Arctic, he said, given the distance from U.S. deep-water ports.  

The 2nd, 3rd and 6th Fleets all have responsibilities in the region, he noted, with the Navy “facing a time/space/force problem in the Arctic,” with too many other challenges around the world. 

“Perhaps we should think outside the box and create a new fleet, an Arctic fleet,” Berbrick said, saying that a total Navy battle fleet sized more toward 400 ships rather than 355 would be needed, which would allow for a fleet “permanently spread out across the Arctic region.” 

He said the supporting shore structure would require reactivating old bases in the Aleutian Islands and Greenland and establishing a port in Nome, Alaska, for example, he said.

ARLINGTON, Va. — The U.S. Navy’s top enlisted leader said the COVID-19 pandemic is teaching the sea service that personnel need as much focus as machines as the Navy works its way to separate processes that work from those that need to be cast aside. 

Master Chief Petty Officer of the Navy (MCPON) Russell Smith spoke July 15 during a webinar, NatSec 2020: Coronavirus and Beyond, co-sponsored by the Navy League of the United States, the Association of the United States Army and Government Matters. 

“We knew going in that we were going to find some better practices, some efficiencies with the way we do business,” Smith said. 

He noted that the Navy’s recruit training center at Great Lakes, Illinois, “has had [fewer] cases of pneumonia, severe flu and hospitalizations than we’ve ever had right now, even in COVID, because of the way we’ve handled people and the way we’ve prevented that inter-exchange of colds and things that all happen when so many people from so many different parts of the country all come together and start sharing their germs.” 

“The way we handled things from a hygiene perspective and some other efficiencies that we certainly learned in this process of bringing [recruits] in will probably stick,” he said.  

“That’s the COVID writ large for us as a Navy,” he said. “We’ve absolutely learned some things that we stopped doing because of COVID that we probably won’t start doing again. Some things we’ll have to go right back to doing as soon as we can, but there are some things — by not having to do them for a while — as an efficiency, we probably don’t need to go back to doing [them].”  

“Where there is challenge, there is opportunity,” said Navy League Executive Director Mike Stevens, Smith’s predecessor as MCPON, also speaking in the webinar. “What I’ve seen in both the private sector and in [the Department of Defense] taking the challenge, looking for these new opportunities, and, primarily where we capitalize on these opportunities in the areas of technology, I think those thing are going to stick.” 

“We’ve learned how to work efficiently from places other than our normal places of duty or work,” Stevens said. “We’re much more effective than I thought we would be.”  

Smith pointed out that the Navy is an expeditionary service, “and when we immediately moved to nearly everyone teleworking, we found out how much our basic services lack the agility that they require for us to dis-aggregate and work remotely. We have to be able to do that far better than we do today. A lot of these forced processes made us catch up quickly.”

ARLINGTON, Va. — Firefighters have extinguished all known fires on the amphibious assault USS Bonhomme Richard in San Diego, the Navy announced. 

“Our fire teams are investigating every space to verify the absence of fire,” Rear Adm. Philip E. Sobeck, commander of Expeditionary Strike Group 3, said in a 1 p.m. Pacific time statement. 

“Until every space is checked and there are no active fires we will not be able to commence any official investigations. We did not know the origin of the fire. We do not know the extent of the damage. It is too early to make any predictions or promises of what the future of the ship will be. We cannot make any conclusions, until the investigation is complete.” 

Some reports outside the Navy indicated the fires were the result of an explosion aboard.  

The fires, which started on the morning of July 12, burned for four days and have severely damaged the ship, the sixth ship of the Wasp class. The ship, based in San Diego, was being upgraded to operate F-35B Lightning II strike fighters, among other modernizations. 

Sobeck said that 63 personnel — 40 U.S. Navy Sailors and 23 civilians — were treated for minor injuries such as heat exhaustion and smoke inhalation. None remain hospitalized. 

“What we do know is that brave Sailors from commands all across San Diego worked tirelessly alongside Federal Firefighters to get this fire extinguished and I want to thank them for their efforts,” he said. “This was a Navy team effort. We had support from the air and sea. Three helicopter squadrons conducted more than 1,500 water bucket drops, fighting the fire and cooling the super structure and flight deck enabling fire crews to get onboard to fight the fire. Tugs also provided firefighting support from the waterline, cooling the ship’s hull. 

“The Navy continues to work together with regulators, county and state in protecting our environment and preparing to address the community’s concerns as we move forward to the next phase,” he said. “I’d like to thank our partners from state and county, the U.S. Coast Guard, and all agencies for continued support.”