Article Posted on : - Jun 01, 2011

SAN DIEGO (BNS): General Dynamics NASSCO has received from the US Navy a $744 million modification to its Mobile Landing Platform (MLP) contract to fully fund construction of the first two ships of the new ship class.

Construction of the first ship will begin immediately, with delivery to occur by the spring of 2013. The contract includes an option for the construction of a third MLP which, if exercised, will increase the total contract value to approximately $1.3 billion, a company statement said.

The Mobile Landing Platform is a new class of auxiliary ship for the Navy. Once delivered to the fleet, these ships will join the three Maritime Prepositioning Force squadrons that are strategically located around the world to enable rapid response in a crisis.

MLPs will provide a “pier at sea” that will become the core of the Navy and Marine Corps seabasing concept. This capability will allow prepositioning ships like LMSR’s and T-AKE’s to offload equipment and supplies to the MLP for transshipment to shore by LCACs or other vessels, it said.

MLP ships will be 233 meters (765 feet) in length and 50 meters (164 feet) in beam, with a design draft of 12 meters (29 feet). The deadweight tonnage is in excess of 60,000 metric tons.