Va. shipbuilders miffed

The Virginia Ship Repair Association has expressed its disappointed in the Navy’s decision to award Huntington Ingalls at Pascagoula, Miss., with a $14 million contract for repair and maintenance work on the Norfolk-based USS Ramage. “It’s very disheartening,” said Bill Crow, president of the VSRA, which has 250 member companies. After hundreds of layoffs across Virginia shipyards in 2015, the expectation had been the USS Ramage (DDG 61) contract would go to a Hampton Roads facility. “This is not just a one-off anomaly,” Crow added. “The work, projected to be completed in August 2017, could be worth up to nearly $21.5 million. HII Pascagoula built Rampage. Navy contracting rules require that if work on a vessel is projected to last more than six months, the contract has to be competed regionally, according to Naval Sea Systems Command. HII Pascagoula’s primary business is building vessels, not repairing them, Crow said. HII Pascagoula’s last major destroyer repair work was 15 years ago on USS Cole. (Virginian-Pilot 09/16/16)