Inspector shortage cited in weld problems

[unhappycamper]

]link:www.navytimes.com/news/2010/05/navy_shipbuilding_welds_050510w/|Inspector shortage cited in weld problems]
By Philip Ewing - Staff writer
Posted : Wednesday May 5, 2010 14:11:47 EDT

A shortage of Navy inspectors helped contribute to systemic quality problems with ships built at the Gulf Coast yards of defense giant Northrop Grumman, a top Navy shipbuilding official said Wednesday.

Brian Persons, the executive director of Naval Sea Systems Command, said that after the Navy looked into the cause of weld problems aboard destroyers and amphibious ships built as far back as 2002 in Avondale, La., and Pascagoula, Miss., officials concluded there were just too few inspectors from the Supervisor of Shipbuilding to ensure the vendors’ work was up to snuff.

In response, NavSea has been steadily adding inspectors to SupShip over the past several months, he said, taking spots that had been cut in the 1990s and early 2000s.

“We’ve been on a very robust hiring curve to get people back into the Supervisor of Shipbuilding,” Persons said. NavSea so far has hired about 300 inspectors and engineers for its SupShip offices around the country, including its offices on the Gulf Coast and on the East and West Coasts.

Persons described the SupShip additions in response to questions about the revelation in January that the Navy had discovered faulty welds aboard Gulf Coast-built ships and Navy inspectors had apparently signed off on them. Since then NavSea has gone back and looked at Louisiana- and Mississippi-built ships, starting with the destroyer Truxtun.



unhappycamper comment: It's Northrop Grumman, what did you expect? Something that works correctly as specified the first time?

[WhiteTara]

1. a big shout out ot George W. Bush

you fucking bastard. Inspectors? Inspectors? We don't need no stinking inspectors!