Extending the Service Life of Aircraft Carriers: Where Should the Work Be Done?

The Navy has established a service life extension program to extend by 15 years the normal 30-year life of its four Forrestal Class aircraft carriers. The Navy has estimated that it will take 28 months to do the work on each carrier, and it plans to do the work between October 1980 and November 1989. The U.S.S. Saratoga is the first carrier scheduled for the extension program, and the Navy decided that the work on this carrier would be done by the Philadelphia Naval Shipyard at an estimated cost between $554 million and $569 million.