by Bradley Parsons
Staff Writer
Mayport Naval Station is at least three years and more than $140 million away from hosting a nuclear aircraft carrier on a permanent basis.
That’s the initial estimate of Mike Saylor, the president of Bessent, Hammack and Ruckman, the engineering firm hired by the City to evaluate the base’s viability as a nuclear homeport. Mayport’s survival may hinge on a successful transition.
The revelation that the Pentagon plans to retire the carrier USS John F. Kennedy has prompted speculation that Mayport could become expendable without its primary tenant.
The City’s top military advisers believe Mayport’s best chance to survive an upcoming round of base closures is to show it can accommodate a nuclear-powered replacement. The Kennedy’s retirement would leave only one diesel-powered vessel in an 11-carrier fleet.
While the base boasts an enviable environment for naval operations, Saylor said there’s a lot of work to be done to prepare it for a nuclear carrier and accompanying safety requirements.
“It’s essentially the same ship (as the Kennedy). But when you start talking about a nuclear propulsion plant, then it becomes a lot more complicated,” said Saylor.
The nuclear carrier requires special maintenance facilities and technicians. The channel will have to be dredged an additional five to 10 feet from its current 39-foot depth. Safety regulations require more room between the hull of a nuclear boat and the channel floor.
Saylor first evaluated Mayport for the Navy 10 years ago and he figured then that the conversion would cost about $141 million. He’s updating that study now for the City and says it’s too early to know how much the cost has changed over a decade.
“We’re just now trying to solve some of the very first questions,” he said. “I can tell you this, without having run the very first number, it’s going to cost more.”
The new cost will include 10 years of inflation and the rising cost of materials like steel and concrete. The area construction boom has increased construction costs across the board, said Saylor.
Whatever the cost, it will be paid by the Pentagon; federal restrictions prevent cities from contributing to military construction. The mayor’s military liaison, Dan McCarthy, said he didn’t think the cost would be an issue — the military will find the money if the City can show the project is feasible, he said.
The City will share the $125,000 bill for the BHR study with the State. The mayor’s office and City Council both chipped in $25,000 while the State paid $75,000.
Saylor didn’t know when the City hired him in December that he would be working on a project that could decide Mayport’s fate.
The mayor’s office says it expects the study done in 90 days to give the City time to present it to the Pentagon prior to the round of base closures scheduled for May.
Saylor hadn’t heard about the 90-day deadline.
“Is 90 days doable? I guess it better be doable if that’s what they said,” he said.
Saylor expects to meet that deadline, but said his job this time around has been complicated by security concerns that didn’t exist 10 years ago.
“The homeland security issues were threats we didn’t have to
consider back then,” he said. “It’s a complicated analysis because security guys don’t normally like to talk about how they do business. A lot of the things you need to know, the military doesn’t want to talk about.”
If the Pentagon follows through on preliminary plans, the Kennedy could be retired by September. In that scenario, the earliest Mayport could hope for a nuclear-powered replacement would be about three years. Saylor expects design and construction to take at least that long.