USS Carl Vinson completes four-year overhaul
After four years out of operational service for a mid-life re-fuelling, complex overhaul (RCOH) and post-shakedown availability/supplemental restricted availability (PSA/SRA) work, the Nimitz-class aircraft carrier USS Carl Vinson (CVN 70) sailed out of Northrop Grumman’s Newport News shipyard on 3 December to rejoin the US Navy’s active fleet.
By 13 December, F/A-18C Hornets from Strike Fighter Squadron 34 and SH-60 Seahawk helicopters, among other aircraft, were participating in two days of carrier flight deck certifications for air department personnel.
Begun in November 2005, Carl Vinson’s USD3.12 billion RCOH has seen the 91,500-ton vessel stripped out and refurbished from the keel up. The refit involved the modernization of some 2,300 compartments.
As part of the vessel’s CAPSTONE combat system upgrade, Raytheon’s Rolling Airframe Missile (RAM) system replaced one of the ship’s two Mk 29 launchers and both Phalanx Vulcan 20 mm close-in-weapon system mounts.
The island superstructure was reconfigured and now bears a 70-ton main mast and updated sensors, similar to those equipping the final Nimitz-class carrier, USS George H W Bush (CVN 77).
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