Newport News Shipbuilding (NNS), a division of
Huntington Ingalls Industries, is the largest industrial employer in
Virginia
Virginia, officially the Commonwealth of Virginia, is a state in the Mid-Atlantic and Southeastern regions of the United States, between the Atlantic Coast and the Appalachian Mountains. The geography and climate of the Commonwealth are ...
, and sole designer, builder and refueler of United States Navy aircraft carriers and one of two providers of
U.S. Navy submarine
A submarine (or sub) is a watercraft capable of independent operation underwater. It differs from a submersible, which has more limited underwater capability. The term is also sometimes used historically or colloquially to refer to remotely op ...
s. Founded as the Chesapeake Dry Dock and Construction Co. in 1886, Newport News Shipbuilding has built more than 800 ships, including both naval and commercial ships. Located in the city of
Newport News, its facilities span more than , strategically positioned in one of the great harbors of the East Coast.
The shipyard is a major employer, not only for the lower
Virginia Peninsula, but also
portions of Hampton Roads south of the
James River and the harbor, portions of the
Middle Peninsula region, and even some northeastern counties of
North Carolina
North Carolina () is a U.S. state, state in the Southeastern United States, Southeastern region of the United States. The state is the List of U.S. states and territories by area, 28th largest and List of states and territories of the United ...
.
The shipyard is building the s and .
In 2013, Newport News Shipbuilding began the deactivation of the first nuclear-powered aircraft carrier, , which it also built.
Newport News Shipbuilding also performs refueling and complex overhaul (RCOH) work on s. This is a four-year vessel renewal program that not only involves refueling of the vessel's nuclear reactors but also includes modernization work. The yard has completed RCOH for five ''Nimitz''-class carriers (, , , and ). As of November 2017 this work was underway for the sixth ''Nimitz''-class vessel, .
History
Industrialist
Collis P. Huntington
Collis Potter Huntington (October 22, 1821 – August 13, 1900) was an American industrialist and railway magnate. He was one of the Big Four of western railroading (along with Leland Stanford, Mark Hopkins, and Charles Crocker) who invested i ...
(1821–1900) provided crucial funding to complete the
Chesapeake and Ohio Railroad (C&O) from
Richmond, Virginia to the
Ohio River in the early 1870s. Although originally built for general commerce, this C&O rail link to the midwest was soon also being used to transport
bituminous coal from the previously isolated coalfields, adjacent to the
New River and the
Kanawha River
The Kanawha River ( ) is a tributary of the Ohio River, approximately 97 mi (156 km) long, in the U.S. state of West Virginia. The largest inland waterway in West Virginia, its valley has been a significant industrial region of the st ...
in
West Virginia
West Virginia is a state in the Appalachian, Mid-Atlantic and Southeastern regions of the United States.The Census Bureau and the Association of American Geographers classify West Virginia as part of the Southern United States while the ...
. In 1881, the
Peninsula Extension of the C&O was built from Richmond down the
Virginia Peninsula to reach a new
coal pier on
Hampton Roads in
Warwick County near the small
unincorporated community
An unincorporated area is a region that is not governed by a local municipal corporation. Widespread unincorporated communities and areas are a distinguishing feature of the United States and Canada. Most other countries of the world either have ...
of
Newport News Point. However, building the railroad and coal pier was only the first part of Huntington's dreams for Newport News.
The shipyard's early years
In 1886, Huntington built a
shipyard to repair ships servicing this transportation hub. In 1891 Newport News Shipbuilding and Drydock Company delivered its first ship, the
tugboat
A tugboat or tug is a marine vessel that manoeuvres other vessels by pushing or pulling them, with direct contact or a tow line. These boats typically tug ships in circumstances where they cannot or should not move under their own power, su ...
''Dorothy''. By 1897 NNS had built three warships for the
US Navy
The United States Navy (USN) is the maritime service branch of the United States Armed Forces and one of the eight uniformed services of the United States. It is the largest and most powerful navy in the world, with the estimated tonnage ...
: , and .
When Collis died in 1900, his nephew
Henry E. Huntington inherited much of his uncle's fortune. He also married Collis' widow
Arabella Huntington, and assumed Collis' leadership role with Newport News Shipbuilding and Drydock Company. Under Henry Huntington's leadership, growth continued.
In 1906 the revolutionary launched a great naval race worldwide. Between 1907 and 1923, Newport News built six of the
US Navy's total of 22
dreadnoughts – , , , , and . All but the first were in active service in
World War II
World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the World War II by country, vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great power ...
. In 1907 President
Theodore Roosevelt
Theodore Roosevelt Jr. ( ; October 27, 1858 – January 6, 1919), often referred to as Teddy or by his initials, T. R., was an American politician, statesman, soldier, conservationist, naturalist, historian, and writer who served as the 26t ...
sent the
Great White Fleet
The Great White Fleet was the popular nickname for the group of United States Navy battleships which completed a journey around the globe from December 16, 1907 to February 22, 1909 by order of President Theodore Roosevelt. Its mission was ...
on its round-the-world voyage. NNS had built seven of its 16
battleships.
In 1914 NNS built SS ''Medina'' for the
Mallory Steamship Company; as she was until 2009 the world's oldest active
ocean
The ocean (also the sea or the world ocean) is the body of salt water that covers approximately 70.8% of the surface of Earth and contains 97% of Earth's water. An ocean can also refer to any of the large bodies of water into which the wor ...
-faring
passenger ship.
Newport News and the shipyard
In the early years, leaders of the Newport News community and those of the shipyard were virtually interchangeable. Shipyard president
Walter A. Post served from March 9, 1911 to February 12, 1912, when he died. Earlier, he had come to the area as one of the builders of the C&O Railway's terminals, and had served as the first mayor of Newport News after it became an
independent city in 1896. It was on March 14, 1914 that Albert Lloyd Hopkins, a young New Yorker trained in engineering, succeeded Post as president of the company. In May 1915 while traveling to England on shipyard business aboard , Albert L. Hopkins tenure and life ended prematurely when that ship was
torpedoed and sunk by a German
U-boat off
Queenstown on the Irish coast. His assistant, Frederic Gauntlett, was also on board, but was able to swim to safety.
Homer Lenoir Ferguson was company vice president when Hopkins died, and assumed the presidency the following August. He saw the company through both world wars, became a noted community leader, and was a co-founder of the
Mariners' Museum with Archer Huntington. He served until July 31, 1946, after
World War II
World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the World War II by country, vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great power ...
had ended on both the European and Pacific fronts.
Just northwest of the shipyard,
Hilton Village
Hilton Village is a planned English-village-style neighborhood in Newport News, Virginia. Recognized as a pioneering development in urban planning, it is listed on the National Register of Historic Places. The neighborhood was built between 1918 ...
, one of the first planned communities in the country, was built by the federal government to house shipyard workers in 1918. The planners met with the wives of shipyard workers. Based on their input 14 house plans were designed for the projected 500 English-village-style homes. After the war, in 1922, Henry Huntington acquired it from the government, and helped facilitate the sale of the homes to shipyard employees and other local residents. Three streets there were named after Post, Hopkins, and Ferguson.
Navy orders during and after World War I
The ''Lusitania'' incident was among the events that brought the United States into World War I. Between 1918 and 1920 NNS delivered 25
destroyer
In naval terminology, a destroyer is a fast, manoeuvrable, long-endurance warship intended to escort
larger vessels in a fleet, convoy or battle group and defend them against powerful short range attackers. They were originally developed ...
s, and after the war it began building
aircraft carriers. was delivered in 1934, and NNS went on to build and .
Ocean liners
After World War I NNS completed a major reconditioning and refurbishment of the
ocean liner . Before the war she had been the German liner ''Vaterland'', but the start of hostilities found her laid up in
New York Harbor and she had been seized by the US Government in 1917 and converted into a
troopship. War duty and age meant that all wiring, plumbing, and interior layouts were stripped and redesigned while her hull was strengthened and her boilers converted from coal to oil while being refurbished. Virtually a new ship emerged from NNS in 1923, and SS ''Leviathan'' became the
flagship of
United States Lines.
In 1927 NNS launched the world's first significant
turbo-electric ocean liner:
Panama Pacific Line
Panama Pacific Line was a subsidiary of International Mercantile Marine (IMM) established to carry passengers and freight between the US East and West Coasts via the Panama Canal.
Although IMM had begun preparations for this intercoastal service ...
's .
At the time she was also the largest merchant ship yet built in the United States,
[ although she was a modest size compared with the biggest European liners of her era. NNS launched ''California''s sister ships '']Virginia
Virginia, officially the Commonwealth of Virginia, is a state in the Mid-Atlantic and Southeastern regions of the United States, between the Atlantic Coast and the Appalachian Mountains. The geography and climate of the Commonwealth are ...
'' in 1928 and ''Pennsylvania
Pennsylvania (; ( Pennsylvania Dutch: )), officially the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, is a state spanning the Mid-Atlantic, Northeastern, Appalachian, and Great Lakes regions of the United States. It borders Delaware to its southeast, ...
'' in 1929. NNS followed them by launching two even larger turbo-electric liners for Dollar Steamship Company: the in 1930, followed by her sister in 1931. was launched in 1939 and entered service with United States lines shortly before World War II but soon returned to the shipyard for conversion to a troopship, USS ''West Point''.
Navy orders before and during World War II
By 1940 the Navy had ordered a battleship, seven more aircraft carriers and four cruisers. During World War II
World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the World War II by country, vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great power ...
, NNS built ships as part of the U.S. Government's Emergency Shipbuilding Program, and swiftly filled requests for " Liberty ships" that were needed during the war. It founded the North Carolina Shipbuilding Company
North Carolina Shipbuilding Company was a shipyard in Wilmington, North Carolina, created as part of the U.S. Government's Emergency Shipbuilding Program in the early days of World War II. From 1941 through 1946, the company built 243 ships in al ...
, an emergency yard on the banks of the Cape Fear River
The Cape Fear River is a long blackwater river in east central North Carolina. It flows into the Atlantic Ocean near Cape Fear, from which it takes its name. The river is formed at the confluence of the Haw River and the Deep River (North Caro ...
and launched its first Liberty ship before the end of 1941, building 243 ships in all, including 186 Libertys. For its contributions during the war, the Navy awarded the company its "E" pennant for excellence in shipbuilding. NNS ranked 23rd among United States corporations in the value of wartime production contracts.
Post-war ships
In the post-war years NNS built the famous passenger liner , which set a transatlantic speed record that still stands today. In 1954 NNS, Westinghouse and the Navy developed and built a prototype nuclear reactor
A nuclear reactor is a device used to initiate and control a fission nuclear chain reaction or nuclear fusion reactions. Nuclear reactors are used at nuclear power plants for electricity generation and in nuclear marine propulsion. Heat fr ...
for a carrier propulsion system. NNS designed in 1960. In 1959 NNS launched its first nuclear-powered submarine
A submarine (or sub) is a watercraft capable of independent operation underwater. It differs from a submersible, which has more limited underwater capability. The term is also sometimes used historically or colloquially to refer to remotely op ...
, .
In the 1970s, NNS launched two of the largest tankers ever built in the western hemisphere and also constructed three liquefied natural gas carrier
An LNG carrier is a tank ship designed for transporting liquefied natural gas (LNG).
History
The first LNG carrier '' Methane Pioneer'' () carrying , classed by Bureau Veritas, left the Calcasieu River on the Louisiana Gulf coast on 25 Januar ...
s – at over 390,000 deadweight tons, the largest ever built in the United States. NNS and Westinghouse Electric Company jointly form Offshore Power Systems
Offshore Power Systems (OPS) was a 1970 joint venture between Westinghouse Electric Company, which constructed nuclear generating plants, and Newport News Shipbuilding and Drydock, which had recently merged with Tenneco, to create floating nucl ...
to build floating nuclear power plants for Public Service Electric and Gas Company.
In the 1980s, NNS produced a variety of Navy products, including nuclear aircraft carriers and nuclear attack submarines. Since 1999 the shipyard has produced only warships for the Navy.
Submarine building problems
In 2007, the US Navy found that workers had used incorrect metal to fuse together pipes and joints on submarines under construction and this could have led to cracking and leaks. In 2009 it was found that bolts and fasteners in weapons-handling systems on four Navy submarines, , , , and , were installed incorrectly, delaying the launching of the boats while the problems were corrected.
Mergers, realignment, and spin-off
In 1968, Newport News merged with Tenneco Corporation. In 1996, Tenneco initiated a spinoff of Newport News into an independent company (Newport News Shipbuilding). The company was purchased by Northrop Grumman in 2001 for $2.6 billion and renamed "Northrop Grumman Newport News". This division was merged with Northrop Grumman Ship Systems in 2008 and given the name " Northrop Grumman Shipbuilding". Three years later, the company was spun off as Huntington Ingalls Industries, Inc., which trades under the symbol HII on the New York Stock Exchange
The New York Stock Exchange (NYSE, nicknamed "The Big Board") is an American stock exchange in the Financial District of Lower Manhattan in New York City. It is by far the world's largest stock exchange by market capitalization of its liste ...
.
Presidents
* Matt Mulherin
* Jennifer Boykin (2017–present)
Ships built
File:Northrop Grumman Newport News 032007 tugboat dorothy.png, ''Dorothy''
File:USS Virginia LOC npcc 32728.jpg, ''Virginia''
File:Moore-McCormack-Good-Neighbor-passenger-liner.jpg, ''California''
File:USS Shark SSN 591.jpg, ''Shark''
File:USS Mississippi (CGN-40).JPG, ''Mississippi''
File:USS Abraham Lincoln (CVN-72) underway in the Atlantic Ocean on 30 January 2019 (190130-N-PW716-1312).JPG, ''Abraham Lincoln''
Other ships built at the Newport News yard include:
* nuclear-powered aircraft carriers:
** , under construction
** USS Doris Miller (CVN-81), under construction
* Liberty ship transports for the Allies during World War II
World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the World War II by country, vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great power ...
* nuclear-powered submarines
* nuclear-powered submarines
Gallery
USS Ronald Reagan christening.jpg, Ronald Reagan Christening
Northrop Grumman Newport News 032007 015.png, North Yard Crane
F-A-18F Super Hornet approaches to USS Gerald R. Ford.jpg,
NNSX 41809 June 10 2008.JPG, Newport News Shipbuilding Foundry & Switch Engine
Ships rebuilt
*, the first sea-going electric power plant for emergencies
*, wrecked ship that was salvaged and her still-operational stern and machinery spaces rebuilt and used in the construction of a new chemical tanker, the Chemical Discoverer, later renamed Chemical Pioneer
World War II Shipbuilding Facilities
References
External links
*
{{Coord, 36.99208, -76.44507, type:landmark_region:US, display=title
Northrop Grumman
Shipbuilding companies of the United States
Companies based in Newport News, Virginia
Maritime history of Virginia
Shipyards building World War II warships