NASSCO competing to build huge warship

http://www.utsandiego.com/news/2014/jun/15/navy-NASSCO-HII/?st

NASSCO competing to build huge warship
By Gary Robbins4:14 p.m.June 15, 2014

The competition to build the Navy's second largest type of warship is heating up.

The Defense Department is giving General Dynamics-NASSCO $23.5 million to see if it can come up with a better and cheaper plan than Huntington Ingalls Industries (HII) to build LHA-8, an unnamed amphibious assault ship that's expected to cost at least $3.5 billion.

The 844-foot vessel is one of the new America-class assault ships. HII's Mississippi-based shipbuilding division constructed the first -- America -- which will be homeported in San Diego, starting this fall. And the company won the contract to build the second, Tripoli.

But the Defense Department decided to open the competition for the third ship after NASSCO expressed interest in the contract, which could generate hundreds of jobs. The government says that NASSCO is the only company other than HII that has experience building and repairing ships roughly the size of America and Tripoli. Earlier this year, NASSCO finished a $150 million overhaul on Essex, a different class of amphibious assault ship.