About a year later than planned, the Coast Guard yesterday awarded Northrop Grumman [NOC] a $480.1 million contract to construct and deliver the fourth Legend-class National Security Cutter (NSC), the 418-foot Hamilton (WMSL-753).
The contract contains options to negotiate awards for long-lead materials for NSCs five and six as well as production for NSC 5. The Hamilton is slated to be delivered in the first quarter of FY ’15, about three years later than the third NSC, the Stratton, which is 65 percent complete and expected to be delivered in the latter half of 2011.
The Coast Guard originally had hoped to get the Hamilton under contract last fall but didn’t get the Request for Proposals out until November 2009 (Defense Daily, Jan. 8, 2009). Then the service had hoped to get the cutter under contract by this past summer (Defense Daily, May 3).
Some of the delays were due to transitioning the contract from Integrated Coast Guard Systems, a joint venture between Lockheed Martin [LMT] and Northrop Grumman that was the lead integrator for the Coast Guard’s asset recapitalization effort, to a sole-source arrangement with Northrop Grumman. The Hamilton is the first NSC to be awarded directly to Northrop Grumman.
Other reasons included synching the build rates at Northrop Grumman’s Pascagoula, Miss., shipyard with the Navy negotiating the options to make contracting for the fifth and sixth vessels easier.
“This contract emphasizes the Coast Guard’s confidence in the NSC’s design and demonstrated performance, as well as the progress we’ve made with our quality and process improvement initiatives,” Irwin Edenzon, vice president and general manager, Northrop Grumman Shipbuilding-Gulf Coast, said in a statement.
The Coast Guard is currently operating its first two NSCs, the Bertholf and the Waesche. The Coast Guard plans to have Northrop Grumman build eight NSCs to replace the fleet of 12 378-foot Hamilton-class High Endurance Cutters.