USS  TEXAS

SSN-775

Texas will be able to attack targets ashore with highly accurate Tomahawk cruise missiles and conduct covert long-term surveillance of land areas, littoral waters or other naval forces. Other missions include anti-submarine and anti-ship warfare, Special Forces delivery and support, and mine delivery and minefield mapping. With enhanced communications connectivity, Texas will also provide important battle group and joint force support, with full integration into carrier battle group operations.

Texas' combat system has already been installed in the Command and Control Module, and testing is in progress at CCSM Off-hull Assembly and Test Site (COATS).

Texas is the 13th submarine to be built in the Northrop Grumman Newport New s Module Outfitting Facility (MOF). In the 130,000-square-foot MOF, submarines are constructed on a level platform, not on an inclined shipway as in years gone by.

Traditionally, labor, material, and equipment flowed through the shipyard to arrive at a single production site: the ship on an inclined way. But construction for Texas has been broken down into two dozen hull sections and modules, with each portion representing a key sub-assembly of the submarine's hull or equipment.

Modules are extensively outfitted and tested "off-hull" before the individual pieces a re loaded into the open ends of hull sections and joined to form the ship. This modular construction process is very similar to working with toy building blocks, but on a gigantic scale. At Newport News the ground-work for modular construction was started in the Ring Module Shop, where initial construction of steel hull sections creates tanks, foundations, and deck assemblies.

Electric Boat's Quonset Point Facility in Rhode Island also contributes groundwork for Texas by building hull rings and subsections outfitted with pipe, machinery, and electrical components. Electric Boat will send 11 major ship sections to Newport News on an ocean-going barge called the Sea Shuttle. Some of these modules will weigh several hundred tons and will ultimately be joined with others built by Newport News to create the Texas. The modules from the Ring Module Shop and Electric Boat will be moved to the MOF, a ten-story building with four large bay doors. Here the work of thousands of employees comes together as major systems and large components are systematically installed and outfitted. Systems and components vary in size - from entire decks and huge condensers to small electric motors and switches. All arrive at the MOF ready for installation on the modules and ultimately in the various hull cylinders.

After each module is completed and loaded into the hull cylinders, four-wheel electric transfer cars are rolled under the hull ring's strongbacks. Hydraulic jacks on the cars lift the large sections of the ship, which are then wheeled into place and welded together to form part of the complete hull. After the modules are joined and the ship's systems are interconnected, transfer cars under the ship's strongbacks will lift the vessel simultaneously and roll the ship on rails (at four feet per minute) to the outboard ways for additional outfitting and testing.

After Texas is christened in 2004, it will be transported westward to the edge of the James River and moved onto the yard's 640-foot floating dry dock. As the ship is transferred from land, the floating dry dock's onboard computer receives input from load sensors, tide gauges, vessel position sensors, draft gauges, and tank level sensors to control 40 onboard ballast tanks so the dock remains level during the loading process. After Texas is loaded, the floating dry dock will move to a nearby 70-foot deep basin where the dock will submerge, and the submarine will float free . Tugboats then will pull the ship out of the dock and to a pier in the South Yard for additional testing in preparation for the ship's sea trials and final delivery to the Navy.

Texas is scheduled for delivery to the Navy in 2005.