GAO: Navy doesn’t have LCS data it needs

[unhappycamper]

A report filed by the Government Accountability Office raised doubts about whether the Navy can set up the crewing and training it needs for its planned fleet of 55 littoral combat ships. It also was skeptical of the Navy’s plans for LCS maintenance, much of which is planned for contractors and sailors ashore — not the ships’ crews. Above, the littoral combat ship Freedom is shown underway in the Atlantic in September.


GAO: Navy doesn’t have LCS data it needs
By Philip Ewing - Staff writer
Posted : Tuesday Feb 2, 2010 18:55:03 EST

A congressional report released Tuesday raised new doubts about whether the Navy can set up the crewing and training it needs for its planned fleet of 55 littoral combat ships, and revealed the service has not done full diligence in reviewing plans and costs for LCS.

The report, filed by the Government Accountability Office at the behest of House lawmakers, was also skeptical of the Navy’s plans for LCS maintenance, much of which is planned for contractors and sailors ashore — not the ships’ crews.

Overall, the Navy has not done many of the full analyses that would help its leaders and Congress, or it has only considered best-case scenarios in its plans and cost estimates, GAO found.

For example, investigators found the Navy didn’t have a lot of strong data to back its concept for the number of sailors that will compose LCS ship and mission-module crews:

“The current Navy plan for a 40-person core crew has not yet been validated by an analysis of the crew’s expected workload,” the report said.


Rest of article at: http://www.navytimes.com/news/2010/02/navy_gao_lcs_020210w/



unhappycamper comment: You spend almost $1.3 billion for two of these ships and you have no clue on how many bodies are going to be needed to manage them? The Navy is out of control.