New aircraft carriers face years of delivery delays
By Zita Ballinger Fletcher
Jul 9, 2025, 10:46 AM
An aerial photo of the Newport News Shipbuilding yard in Virginia in September 2021. Aircraft carriers Gerald. R. Ford and John F. Kennedy sit at the pier in the foreground. (Newport News Shipbuilding photo)
Two new aircraft carriers will yet again experience delays in delivery, after already having previously delayed in past years, Navy budget documents reveal.
The delivery of the Navy’s next Ford-class aircraft carrier, to be christened the John F. Kennedy, will now be delayed by two more years, the Navy’s Fiscal Year 2026 budget justification documents show.
It had been scheduled to be delivered this month. Delivery is now pushed back until March 2027. Before this latest setback, the carrier had already been delayed by an estimated one year.
Additionally, another repeat delay is in store for the future carrier Enterprise, which was scheduled to be delivered in September 2029. The budget documents now show that “due to delays in material availability and industry/supply chain performance,” it is now projected to be finished in July 2030.
https://www.defensenews.com/newsletters/2025/07/09/new-aircraft-carriers-face-years-of-delivery-delay/
