Projo Biz Blog

New Hampshire (SSN 778), the nation's newest nuclear-powered attack submarine, returned to the Electric Boat shipyard in Groton, Conn. today following the completion of its first voyage in open seas, called alpha sea trials.

New Hampshire's trials included submerging for the first time, performing a range of submarine and propulsion-plant operations and conducting high-speed runs on the surface and underwater to demonstrate that the ship's propulsion plant is fully mission-capable.

New Hampshire will be delivered to the U.S. Navy by the end of summer. Director of Naval Nuclear Propulsion Adm. Kirkland Donald, who directed the sea trials, said, "New Hampshire, the fifth of the Virginia Class, performed satisfactorily in all operations and this success is a direct result of the hard work of both the crew and the shipbuilders."

Electric Boat, which runs a plant at Quonset Point that helped build the submarine, has won contracts to build the first 10 submarines of a planned 30-ship Virginia Class under a teaming agreement that splits the construction workload between Electric Boat and Northrop Grumman Shipbuilding. Electric Boat is a wholly owned subsidiary of General Dynamics (GD:NYSE)

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