rickusn

to retirement:

April 27, 2006

Warner changes mind, backs decommissioning JFK

By Mark D. Faram
Times staff writer


The Navy is one step closer to decommissioning the aircraft carrier John F. Kennedy, and the green light to mothball the ship could come within weeks.

The news comes as Sen. John Warner, R-Va., tacked an amendment onto the current warfare supplemental spending bill that would allow the service to operate only 11 aircraft carriers instead of the 12 currently required by law.


The purpose of this amendment is to revise the previous legislation such that the Secretary of the Navy can retire this ship, Warner said April 26 on the Senate floor.

The amendment passed by a voice vote, according to the Congressional Record.

This change of heart comes a year after Warner used a similar amendment to stall the retirement of the 38-year old Kennedy by making it law that the Navy keep 12 carriers operating until six months after the Quadrennial Defense Review was released.

Still, a quick trip to mothballs is far from a done deal. The amendment requires approval of the House of Representatives and the President before becoming law.

Warner based his reversal, he said, on advice from the Navy.

Subsequent to the legislation by the Congress and the law enacted, the Navy has determined that the USS John F. Kennedy ... in the judgment of the Chief of Naval Operations, is not qualified to perform her primary mission of aviation operations, he said.

In short, he said, the Kennedy is not safe to operate.

There are very real concerns regarding the ability to maintain the Kennedy in an operationally safe condition for our sailors at sea,? Warner said.

Repairing it is no longer a viable option, he said, as the price tag to restore the ship to a deployable status would cost an inordinate amount of money.

Also, its not just the cost of refurbishment that?s out of hand, he said. Simply maintaining the ship in its current state will cost the Navy $20 million a month in operations and manpower costs ? money the Navy badly needs for operations and modernization programs.

The toll on the crew was also noted. Warner said JFKs limbo status levies an untold burden on the lives of the sailors and families assigned to the Kennedy, he said.

Those families, he said, need to be able to get on with their lives.

As for the ship, Chief of Naval Operations, Adm. Mike Mullen told Navy Times in February hed like to see Kennedy gone as soon as possible. His preference would be she leave her Mayport, Fla., home port before the start of hurricane season in June.

Warner said the fact the JFK can no longer serve in the fleet is painful to him and others, mainly because of the ships namesake, the late President John F. Kennedy.

But even those who were closest to Kennedy seem resigned to the fate of the ship.

It is bittersweet to know that she will be retired, said Sen. Edward M. Kennedy in a statement.

But the people of Massachusetts and the Kennedy family are very proud of her service and know she holds a special place in the hearts of the Navy and the Nation.

dalem

Friend of the family was, I believe, assistant CAG on the JFK a while back. I missed a chance for a personal tour because my mom didn't think I'd be that interested, grrrr!

-dale

PubFather

Mothers... who would have them....?

Seriously though.. wont this leave the USN short a carrier just when then need one?
(i.e given the Iran situ).

gunnut

Maybe we can borrow the HMS Queen Elizabeth?

PubFather

You're more than welcome to her - if and when she ever gets built
just as long as we can borrow the Carl Vinson when the Argies invade the Falklands again....

Seriously, just hope the dickhead polititians over here realise that if u want to play an international role - u have 2 pay for it... dont leave our boys n girls with their arses hanging in the wind...

Sea Toby

The JFK is 40 years old. While she has been updated over the years, she was designed to last 40 years, and she has reached her paying off point in her life. The Enterprise is also over 40 years in age, but she was given a life extension being a nuclear propelled vessel, the Nimitz and Eisenhower will be 40 years in age soon. It appears instead of building two carriers every ten years we need to increase the building numbers in the next ten years to four, that is if we intend to keep 11-12 carriers in the fleet.

Frankly, with one of the twelve carriers slated for a long term nuclear refueling, we are already down to 11 carrier air groups. Having only 11 carriers along with 11 carrier air groups isn't the end of the world. Since the one carrier in a long term refueling isn't really operational, the eleventh air group really doesn't need to be combat ready either.

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gunnut

I have some questions.

What do conventional ships burn? They used to burn coal in the early days of steam powered warships. Then they moved onto oil fired boilers. What kind of oil? Crude? Heavy? What exactly is heavy oil? Then there's marine diesel and gas turbine. Obviously marine diesel burns diesel. What does gas turbine burn?

Sea Toby

The heavy oil is burned by ships whether diesel or gas turbine or steam. Its the cheapest grade by far, as its the stuff from the ground, unrefined.

Boats are a different story.

TopHatter

The Navy (or whatever ships you want to talk about for that matter) burn oil pumped right out of the ground, unrefined?

Ah, no. I don't think so.

We'll use the USN for a specific example. They used to burn Navy Special Fuel Oil, or No. 5 fuel oil. This was very thick and tar-like oil. Not exactly something that required a huge amount of refining, but hardly unrefined.

Back then, depending on the purity of the crude, you could theoretically pump it right into your battleship's fuel bunkers and sail the ship on it...

...if you didn't mind your Chief Engineer blowing first your - and then his - brains out with a Colt .45 after the journey was over because "his" power plant would be a useless slag-heap.

...assuming you actually completed the journey.

This is all just neat history though because they've since converted (decades ago actually) to Diesel Fuel Marine or DFM, which is a much lighter distillate and very much a refined product.

We'll see if we can get RustyBattleship or RAL'sPal in on this one. I'm pretty sure they were both around back when coal-fired ships were state of the art.



Edit: Gunnut: A certain princess of petroleum dropped a .pdf or two off in my lap. Enjoy!

Attached Files

	Marine Diesel Fuel.pdf (67.9 KB, 15 views)
	Infosheet on marine fuels.pdf (42.2 KB, 18 views)

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RAL's_pal?

It's been a long time, but the gas turbine jobs use JP-5 and the ships with boilers use a Navy distillate fuel that may be JP-4. I'm sure cRustyRattleship will be along soon after storing away his memorabilia from Saturday's American Legion sale.

TopHatter

Hey look at that. And I didn't even have to send him an email

TheGreenSmoke

So, will the CVN 21 be filling in for the JFK?

TopHatter

USS Enterprise actually...if things go as planned one would assume.

http://www.navy.mil/navydata/fact_di...0&tid=200&ct=4

THL

More on Marine Fuels

I'll be called a traitor for even looking at this but here is some pretty good information as well.

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