“The experience of LCS, it broke the Navy,” said Sean Stackley, Assistant Secretary of the Navy for research, development and acquisition.
The Navy’s ambitious Littoral Combat Ship (LCS) program promised low cost, highly flexible, reliable, multi-mission ships. So far they have delivered none of these. Last Thursday, a panel of Navy and government oversight officials told the Senate Armed Services Committee about billions in cost overruns, delayed deliveries, repeated breakdowns, reduced mission capabilities and the questionable survivability of the new LCS.
LCS costs have risen from an estimated $220 million per ship to an average of $478 million. In a Government Accountability Office (GAO) report issued on Thursday which reviewed the $29 billion LCS program, the GAO says that Congress must decide “whether a ship that costs twice as much yet delivers less capability than planned warrants an additional investment.” Continue reading
The three masted barque 
Overfishing is a huge problem in the world’s oceans. Exacerbating the problem is fishing piracy. A year ago, we posted “
When the New York Times features your obituary on the front page, it probably means that you are dead. Sadly, that is the case of with historic ferryboat 
The 
More teething problems on 
Douglas Reeman needs our help. If you have ever read any of the thirty volumes of the nautical adventures of Richard Bolitho, you probably know the author by his pen name, Alexander Kent. In total, Reeman has written close to 60 books and has made an indelible mark on the literature of the sea. Now, at 92 and in failing health, we have the opportunity to, in some small measure, make his path easier. A message from his wife Kim:
Last week, a 
Yesterday, we 
Humpback whales are back, or, at the very least, there seems to be a good case for cautious optimism. In 1986, at the beginning of the moratorium on commercial whaling, the global population of humpback whales had dropped by 90% due to whaling. North Atlantic humpback populations dropped to as low as 700 whales. Now just shy of thirty years later, humpback whales have made a dramatic recovery.