JHSV gets larger role in Navy, Marine plans - Marine Corps News | News from Afghanistan & Iraq - Marine Corps Times

JHSV gets larger role in Navy, Marine plans

Marines and special-operations SEALs may soon be going to war onboard aluminum, twin-hulled catamarans derived from commercially successful civilian ferries.

Pentagon plans to buy 10 Joint High Speed Vessels for use by the Army and Navy are expanding, driven by a recent decision that the 338-foot-long ships can carry out a wider variety of military missions. The ships will even be used, in some situations, as replacements for the current flock of small, 170-foot patrol coastal craft.

“There was a big debate within the [Navy] department on patrol craft, PCs,” Navy Undersecretary Bob Work said Wednesday during an interview. “People said these are very good for irregular warfare. But when we looked at it we said we wanted to have self-deployable platforms that have a lot of payload space that you can take to the fight whatever you need — SEALs, Marines, riverine squadrons. So we decided to increase the Joint High Speed Vessel program.”

Work said the Navy now envisions buying up to 23 of the ships for its own use, in addition to five being built for the Army.

“We like their self-deployability aspects,” Work said. “They can be a sea base, they can be an Africa Partnership Station, they’re extremely flexible.”

The ships were designed by Austal USA, which is building the first three in a new facility at its Mobile, Ala., shipyard. The company received its initial JHSV contract in November 2008, and on Jan. 28 the Navy ordered two more.

The ships cost about $160 million apiece and can hit 45 knots, with a cruise speed of about 35 knots. More than 300 Marines and their gear can be accommodated for up to four days. The ships will have a flight deck able to land an H-53 helicopter and a mission bay that can carry M1 Abrams main battle tanks.

The Navy also has decided to keep the 13 PCs currently in its inventory, including three on temporary loan to the Coast Guard. The ships, built in the 1990s, will be refurbished and upgraded, Work said, “so they’re going to be with us well into the 2020s.”

Together with 55 planned Littoral Combat Ships that also feature large mission bays, the Navy will have a greatly enhanced ability to carry troops and materials to the fight.

“When you combine LCS and the Joint High Speed Vessel together, that’s going to be 78 small craft with a lot of payload space that can be configured for a lot of these irregular warfare missions,” Work said.