Transplant complete, attack sub floats again

[unhappycamper]

The fast-attack submarine San Francisco floats off its dry dock for the first time Oct. 10 after two years in the shipyard. It became the first submarine to get the transplanted bow section of another sub, a sister ship, the Honolulu.


Transplant complete, attack sub floats again
By Philip Ewing - Staff writer
Posted : Tuesday Oct 21, 2008 19:51:00 EDT

More than three years after a devastating underwater crash killed one sailor, injured 100 more and crushed the bow of the fast-attack submarine San Francisco, the ship has returned to the water after a first-of-its kind overhaul.

In the maritime equivalent of a major organ transplant, workers at Puget Sound Naval Shipyard, Wash., amputated more than 1 million pounds’ worth of the bow section of the decommissioned attack sub Honolulu and grafted it onto the ailing San Francisco.

“The engineering and production teams proceeded to manipulate the mammoth structure with orchestrated precision,” according to an announcement from Naval Sea Systems Command. “In some areas, the bow of this massive structure was moved to within 1/16 of an inch of the original structure.”

With the surgery complete, the San Francisco floated off its dry dock for the first time Oct. 10. The ship has been in the yard since December 2006.

The systems transferred from the Honolulu — a newer Los Angeles-class sibling commissioned in 1985, four years after the San Francisco — included its active sonar sphere and its forward ballast tanks.


Rest of article at: http://www.navytimes.com/news/2008/10/navy_sub_surgery_102108w/%2e