The GAO found in 2020 that between 2015 and 2019, the average idle time where nuclear aircraft carriers and submarines had to wait for maintenance had increased from 100 days to 1019, an increase of 919 percent. If that sounds like a huge problem to you, you’re on the right track. The GAO also found that some shops at the four public shipyards were forced to rely on up to 45 percent overtime to complete their scheduled maintenance, and that the average lifespan of the heavy equipment needed for maintenance at the shipyards had expired in 2015, forcing precious time and resources to be devoted to additional maintenance for the equipment that was supposed to be doing maintenance on ships.

The consequences of this are dire. US CENTCOM, responsible for the Middle East, was forced to go without a carrier group on station for nine months of last year. Currently, there are only five out of eleven carrier groups deployed, with the others either undergoing or waiting for maintenance. In a world with 140 million square miles of ocean and potential trouble spots on five continents plus the need to provide security near the mainland USA, five carriers are spread as thin as the shipyard workers pulling 45 percent overtime. FMA recently wrote an op-ed in support of this additional funding and laying out the reasons that providing it is so urgently needed. To read the full piece, click here.

To address this issue, FMA urges Congress to pass the strongly bipartisan SHIPYARD Act (S. 1441 / H.R. 2860), sponsored by Sen. Roger Wicker (R-MS) in the Senate and Rep. Rob Wittman (R-VA) in the House. This legislation provides the 21 billion dollars to improve and modernize infrastructure at the four public shipyards, allowing them to carry out their mission with the tools and resources critically needed for the job.

S. 1441 currently has 18 cosponsors:

• Sen. Tim Kaine (D-VA)
• Sen. Susan Collins (R-ME)
• Sen. Angus King (I-ME)
• Sen. Jeanne Shaheen (D-NH)
• Sen. Tom Cotton (R-AR)
• Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-CT)
• Sen. Maggie Hassan (D-NH)
• Sen. Mazie Hirono (D-HI)
• Sen. Brian Schatz (D-HI)
• Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith (R-MS)
• Sen. Patty Murray (D-WA)
• Sen. Tommy Tuberville (R-AL)
• Sen. Tammy Baldwin (D-WI)
• Sen. Bob Casey (D-PA)
• Sen. Mike Rounds (R-SD)
• Sen. Chris Murphy (D-CT)
• Sen. Kevin Cramer (R-ND)
• Sen. Todd Young (R-IN)

H.R. 2860 has 16 cosponsors:

• Rep. Mike Gallagher (R-WI)
• Rep. Elaine Luria (D-VA)
• Rep. Bobby Scott (D-VA)
• Rep. Ed Case (D-HI)
• Rep. Jared Golden (D-ME)
• Rep. Jerry Carl (R-AL)
• Rep. Steven Palazzo (R-MS)
• Rep.Kaiali’I Kahele (D-HI)
• Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick (R-PA)
• Rep. Robert Aderholt (R-AL)
• Rep. Chellie Pingree (D-ME)
• Rep. Derek Kilmer (D-WA)
• Rep. Mary Gay Scanlon (D-PA)
• Rep. Donald McEachin (D-VA)
• Rep. Chris Pappas (D-NH)
• Rep. Jefferson Van Drew (R-NJ)