House considers putting Kennedy, Kitty Hawk back into service in five years

[unhappycamper]

House considers putting Kennedy, Kitty Hawk back into service in five years
By Leo Shane III, Stars and Stripes
Mideast edition, Friday, May 16, 2008

WASHINGTON — House officials want to explore the possibility of bringing the USS John F. Kennedy or USS Kitty Hawk back into service in five years to keep the Navy’s carrier fleet at full force.

During debate on their draft of next year’s defense budget authorization, the House Armed Services Committee approved an amendment to study the cost and logistics of reactivating the carriers after their decommissioning over the next few years.

At issue is the Navy’s request to drop below the congressionally mandated 11-carrier fleet in 2012, when the USS Enterprise is taken out of service.

It will be replaced by USS Gerald R. Ford, the newest carrier from the class of the same name, but Navy officials have said it won’t be commissioned until 2015 at the earliest.

House officials were even more pessimistic, saying construction delays could leave the Navy with only 10 carriers for up to four years. But for now they’ve rejected the Navy’s request to continue temporarily one carrier short, instead asking for the study.


Rest of article at: http://www.stripes.com/article.asp?section=104&article=54834

[Jack Bone]

1. I hope it's the JFK!

The nickname that the USS Kitty Hawk had when I was in, back 18 years ago, was "The Shitty Kitty". I can't imagine that things have gotten better for her since.