Modern Naval Warfare - Navy Log Book #5 - The Virginia-class Submarine

Copyright 2003 U.S.DoD. Graphic by Ron Stern. Image ID 030521-D-9078S-001 Ahoy Modern Naval Warfare Fans. In this Navy Logbook we will look at your workhorse, the Virginia class submarine. This series of boats is the latest in service into the US Navy. Be sure to read to the end for some shiny new footage of the command stations featured in Modern Naval Warfare.

In Modern Naval Warfare, you will be able to command either a Virginia Block I, II or III but before entering into the details, let’s have a very short historical background on the Virginia submarine.

The Virginia-class submarines have their roots in the Seawolf class submarines, which was designed during the Cold War to counter the Soviet submarine threat. However, due to cost concerns, the Seawolf program was scaled back; only four units are currently in service.

A new class of submarines was requested. The Virginia-class submarine program officially began in 1998, with the goal of producing a versatile and cost-effective submarine for a variety of missions, including anti-submarine warfare, land strike missions and finally intelligence surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR) with a Special Force delivery capability.

To reduce the cost of the submarine, it was decided to use a modular construction system and wherever possible use COTS (Commercial Off-The-Shelf) parts and softwares. For example, the SONAR suite named the Acoustics-Rapid COTS Insertion (A-RCI) is installed on the submarine. This give the ability to upgrade either the hardware or the software more often, reduce drastically the maintenance costs.

Two naval yards, General Dynamics Electric Boat in Groton and Huntington Ingalls Industries/ Newport News Shipbuilding, Newport, were chosen for the submarine production. The goal was to produce at least two Virginia per year to keep the cost contained.

With the new AUKUS trilateral security partnership, 2.33/year boats are expected to be build but currently the delivery is only 1.2/year, which also raised the total cost of the program.

The first Virginia-class submarine, USS Virginia (SSN-774), was laid down in 1999 and commissioned in 2004. Since then, 22 are in active service, 2 in pre-commissioning, 10 in different building phase. A total of 66 boat were requested by the USN.

Over the years, the Virginia-class submarines have undergone various upgrades and improvements to enhance their capabilities. These include the integration of new weapons launch systems, improved sonar and communication systems.

Specifications:

Length - 377 ft (115 m)

Beam - 34 ft (10 m

Propulsion - One S9G nuclear reactor delivering 280,000 hp (210 MW)

Speed - +25 knots (46 km/h)

Test depth - +800 ft (240 m)

Crew - 135 (15 officers and 120 enlisted)

As we wrote before, Modern Naval warfare reproduce the three first block of the series. A block is a batch of boat with the “same” configuration. In fact, almost all submarines are a little different one from the others; new equipment can be installed in one and not in the others or a software upgrade not applied. Modifications of the submarines are done during period of long overhaul.

Block I & Block II

The main visible difference between those are the number of segments used during the construction. Originally, for the first four hulls (hull 774 to 778), 10 modules were built and then assembled to form a Virginia.

For the Block II, only four super-modules are used, reducing the whole cost, number of parts and time to build one submarine.

Block III

Block III is a small departure from the two first block. The 12 independent bays housing