“As Rep. Elaine Luria sees it, this week’s decision to extend the deployment of the USS Abraham Lincoln speaks to a more serious problem with the aircraft carrier fleet, and the evidence is front and center in Hampton Roads.”
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“But at the moment, not one of the Navy’s six East Coast carriers — either at Naval Station Norfolk or Newport News Shipbuilding — are close to combat-ready, Luria said in a House Armed Services hearing this week.”
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“In an exchange with Navy leaders, the Virginia Beach Democrat said: “So the taxpayers have made a good investment to have six carriers on the East Coast, plus I understand one on the West Coast — seven of our 11 carriers — in a non-deployable status, and we’re having to extend the Lincoln on deployment because of one emergent casualty on one carrier? That’s where you desire to be?”
