Irving Shipbuilding Inc grabs the gold ring

The announcement that Irving Shipbuilding Inc has been named prime contractor the RCN frigate replacement program is perhaps the biggest news coming out of Halifax Shipyard since the announcement in 2011 that they had been selected to build the frigates.
Several world scale powerhouse bidders were no doubt vying for the prime status which would have relegated ISI to sub-contractors. Even before the decision of the tribunal in the National Ship Procurement Strategy there was never much doubt that Halifax Shipyard would build the frigates. Irving's credentials as builders of most of the current frigates and refitters of the east coast frigates gave them credibility, even if there are few if any people left in the ISI organization who were involved in the original construction of the Halifax class ships.
However being prime contractor is a far bigger prize than (just) being the builders.
As prime contractor they will essentially be in charge of all aspects of the program, and will call the shots to the myriad suppliers and  sub-contractors. Their ability to get performance out of those subs will be key to the success of the program, both in terms of budget, but also of delivery time and performance. No one should under estimate ISI's determination in those areas.

 The massive new building hall dwarfs the Novadock which will be replaced.

The south end of the yard where the current frigates are being upgraded has a newly built parking structure, the graving dock, machine shop wharf and an ant colony of temporary buildings. 

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1973 time warp - Iroqouis, Athabaskan, Preserver - still with us.

Looking back through my records for December 1973, there are a lot of now dimly remembered or forgotten merchant ship names, none of which are still in service.

Such is not the case among naval vessels. Ships participating in Marcot, a three week naval exercise involving the RCN, RN and USN returned  to Halifax. HMCS Preserver, Annapolis (leader), Iroquios (leader) Assiniboine, Margaree, Nipigon, Qu'Appelle,  Okanagan, Onandaga, and Athabaskan arrived December 14, with Algonquin and Yukon to return December 17. HMS Ashanti did not come in to Halifax as far as I can tell. The USN participated with an Orion aircraft.
( I believe this was the first exercise for the new Tribals.)

I don't have photos from December 1973, but I have some that are relevant.

 1. July 1, 1980 saw Huron, Iroquois and Skeena dressed all over.

The Tribal class destroyers Iroquois and Athabaskan and the supply ship Preserver are still with us, and will be for some time to come as controversy still surrounds their replacements.

2. Protecteur and Preserver together at Imperial Oil while fueling in 1982.

Not surprisingly the Canadian Auditor General has now come out and stated that Canada will be paying a huge premium to build new supply ships in Canada. He faults the National Ship Replacement Strategy (NSPS) for the way it has picked two shipyards and other critics claim that Seaspan and Irving Shipbuilding have been given blank cheques to build ships without competitive pricing.

Our government knew that the political importance of building these ships in Canada would have a higher price tag. Not only that, they had to make up a huge deficit in Canadian shipbuilding capacity because previous governments failed to act on ship replacement, allowing the yards to die. Blaming the government for not knowing the size of that premium is a little self-serving in my opinion. Surely the AudG knows that there is no naval program anywhere in the world that is not plagued with overruns, delays and escalations. Name any country you like and naval shipbuilding is a controversial subject. The government needed to act, they chose a "no favouritism" method of selecting the builders and got the program moving, by first rebuilding the shipyards  The old method of calling for competitive pricing for a design package obviously did not work in the past -and would mean endless delays which would cost even more if allowed to continue.

The Auditor General would be well advised to comment and make recommendations on cost control measures to be put in place during the program, rather than carping about decisions that have already been made on a political basis. No sound business case could ever be made for building these ships in Canada - but the need to have a Canadian shipbuilding industry is a matter of sovereignty and patriotism. In an era of exporting technical and manufacturing jobs from Canada to the Third World, it makes political sense to create jobs in Canada. It also allows to keep a little corner on our needs without having to rely on other countries.

3. Pre-TRUMP Iroquois makes an early morning arrival in Halifax in 1980. The destroyers may be among the last ships to be replaced in the NSPS. They lost their distinctive canted funnels in that refit.

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Canadian Coast Guard, more news as the NSPS continues to roll out

There was another announcement on Wednesday regarding shipbuilding as part of the massive replacement/ modernization of Canada's government fleet.

First it was the combatant (Halifax Shipyard) and non-combatant (Seaspan Shipyard) ships, announced last year as part of the NSPS (National Ship Procurement Strategy) both of which will inject major money into the economy for a long time to come. The government finally woke up to the fact that shipyard's are good for the economy, and became willing to build not just ships, but a whole shipbuilding industry. How that will work out in the long term remains to be seen, but it cannot be denied that we will get a whole bunch of new ships for the navy and Coast Guard, and a vastly upgraded shipbuilding industry. Whether it will pay back a return on the government's investment is a moot point, since it is so far beyond any one government's normal planning process. It is a kind of Keynesian attitude of leaving it to future generations to worry about.
Irving Shipbuilding's Halifax yard is a beehive of activity already, where it is expanding northward to build the bigger ships.

The research ship CCGS Alfred Needler is one of the ships to be replaced under the larger NSPS announcement. The new ship will be built in Vancouver.

Second was the announcement in February that $360 mn will be put into 18  Coast Guard ships to upgrade them and give then life extensions. This includes the four heavy icebreakers (Amundesn is already done now.  Because of engine failures last year it had a major rebuild at St.Catharines over the winter.)

CCGS Edward Cornwallis is one of the six multi-tasked vessels to get a life extension.

Six multi-tasked vessels, (3 based here), one medium endurance (based here) one science, two offshore patrol, two special navaids and two air cushions will also be upgraded over the next ten years - none too soon for some of them. There may be no NSPS restrictions on which yard can bid on this work.

CCGS Early Grey is the medium endurance ship that will get a life extension/upgrade.

Wednesday's announcement of $488 mn for Coast Guard small ships and craft, under 1,000 tonnes, which will not be built by Irving or Seaspan (that was also part of NSPS) will see 18 to 21 new boats added in the next seven years. These would not be good fits for the big yards anyway, and it was NSPS  strategy to give some boatbuilding yards and some smaller shipyards some needed business too.

Still to come are new tugs for the navy, both large and small. We are sure to get that announcement fairly soon as the summer spending continues.

 The navy will be replacing all its tugs (large and small) and its fireboats.

Meanwhile there are some puzzles. Such as CCGS Matthew which has not re-entered service this year after its winter layup. The survey ship has not been mentioned in any announcements, so presumably it is idled by lack of funds.Built in 1991 it is one of the newest ships in the CCG/DFO and and uniquely a hydrographic ship - it doesn't seem to perform any other function, and recent government cuts may be to blame.

A forlorn CCGS Matthew sits alongside BIO- not in service this summer. That is Halifax Traffic VTS station on the hill behind.

Another Shipbuilding Announcement

There was another shipbuilding announcement in Halifax today. Despite the supposed "depoliticization" of the National Shipbuilding Procurement Strategy for major Canadian ships, the event was another opportunity for the government. The first word in the title of the Press Release is "Harper", so you will understand how little it really had of any substance in it. In fact it was an outline of a process that, similar to the one on the west coast, was short of detail. 
If read in its entirety : http://news.gc.ca/web/article-eng.do?mthd=tp&crtr.page=1&nid=724329&crtr.tp1D=1
it states that the first two of seven work packages of the Definition Contract have been awarded. These packages are for managing the contract and the first of three engineering design packages for the Arctic Offshore Patrol Vessels.
The announcement was quite free of any detail on how many ships will be built and who will be designing them. We understand that the designers are to be Odense of Denmark.
Reference was also made to the $300mn upgrades to Halifax Shipyard, which will be carried out at no cost to Canadian taxpayers. That work has already started as the proliferation of construction cranes at pier 6 will attest. The arrival on the weekend of the dredge Cranemaster and dump scow HD 7 and workboat Atlantic Tamerack also signals a start to the dredging component of the work. The tug Swellmaster brought in the dredge and returned again to Saint John.