Aircraft carriers are one of the key weapons in the US arsenal and which it often uses in strike groups deployed to regions where Washington wants to project its military might. They are frequent guests in the Persian Gulf and South China Sea, despite some local countries calling such deployments “provocations”.
Six of the eleven American aircraft carriers, all of them assigned to port in Norfolk on the US East Coast, are currently non-functional and undergoing either repairs or maintenance, some of which may last for around two years, the media outlet Breaking Defence reported, citing data obtained from the US Navy.
It was reportedly expected that at least one of the East Coast carriers would be functional, but the USS Harry S. Truman (CVN 75) was forced to abandon its mission in September 2019 due to issues with its electric grid and return to Norfolk for repairs. Various sources gave conflicting assessments of how this impacted processes at the port in interviews with the media outlet.
Some of them shared that in order to fix the USS Truman in the shortest time possible, people were reassigned from other tasks and some of the components needed for the repairs were ripped from other carriers stationed in Norfolk. This, in turn, reportedly impacted the schedule for their return to operation. Other sources, including a Navy spokesperson, stated that no delays to the repairs of the remaining five carriers are expected as a result of the USS Truman's arrival.
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