The U.S. Navy/ABS Service Life Assessment Program

One of the most challenging aspects of fleet husbandry today for any Government ship owner is the proper assessment of where to spend maintenance resources to keep ships mission ready and safe for the personnel who sail them as well as for the operating environment. Budgets are becoming more and more constrained, personnel have less time to spread their attention over all the systems that comprise the total ship system, and operating tempos are increasing. As a result, it is imperative to identify and implement processes facilitating the ability to focus attention where it is most needed, and where it will provide the best return on investment. The Naval Sea Systems Command and the American Bureau of Shipping (ABS) have recently partnered in a 'Service Life Assessment Pilot' for the U.S. Navy introducing a structured, thirdparty periodic condition assessment process for selected systems on a number of classes of Navy ships. The intent is to determine areas where ABS can assist the Navy and share common knowledge and processes in identifying where maintenance action is most needed on ships, and recommend focused inspections whereby the continuing health of these systems may be tracked. The intent of this paper is to describe the components that make up the Service Life Assessment Program and the potential benefits from application of ABS in-service classification practices applied to selected naval ship classes in the context of current Navy methods, processes, and procedures for inspection and maintenance.