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The Honolulu Advertiser
Updated at 9:38 a.m., Monday, March 2, 2009

Navy report lists extensive damage to Port Royal ... and more may be coming

By PHILIP EWING
Navy Times

The cruiser Port Royal suffered widespread damage after it ran aground Feb. 5, according to an internal Navy report that detailed problems not only with propulsion gear, but also weapons, radars and other topside systems.

The preliminary damage assessment, a copy of which was obtained by Navy Times, depicts a ship in need of repairs that will cost tens of millions of dollars and take months in a dry dock, experts agreed.

Not only did the grounding cost the Port Royal several propeller blades, its sonar dome and both its anchors, the ship suffered extensive damage as it lay aground and rolled with the surf for three days before it was pulled off by salvage ships.

Some of the problems cited in the report include:

• Both drive shafts and their support struts suffered heavy pressure and twisting, and one seal leaked where the shaft goes through the hull.

• Instruments on the ship's underside, including its devices for measuring speed and water depth, were damaged when they struck the bottom.

• The hatches of the forward and aft vertical launch cells, which hold Port Royal's arsenal of missiles, were damaged as the ship's hull rolled and flexed with the waves.

• The antennae and other equipment on the ship's mast endured "severe shock" as the ship rolled on the reef. The shocks also affected the alignment of Port Royal's Aegis radar arrays and other sensitive gear, costing the ship the use of its Aegis sensors as well as its ballistic-missile defense capability.

• The ship's wastewater and seawater ballast systems are clogged with sand and coral from the reef, which backed up half of Port Royal's heads and prevents it from running its air conditioning. A lack of air conditioning not only makes spaces less comfortable for the crew, it means the ship can't cool its suite of advanced electronics gear.

As broad as the cruiser's damage was, inspectors might find even more problems as they inspect its internal equipment, especially in its engineering spaces.

The Port Royal definitely needs new propellers and a new sonar dome, but depending on how much pressure and twisting the ship suffered when it grounded, the cruiser also could need new drive shafts, main reduction gears and main engines, maritime engineering consultant John Tylawsky said.

Navy Times showed Tylawsky Navy-released photographs of the ship in dry dock and asked for an educated assessment of what engineers might find as they go over problems caused by the grounding.

Replacing the Port Royal's main engines — four LM 2500 gas turbines — is a relatively routine job; the ship is designed to change out its turbines in about a day. But new reduction gears, which turn the ship's drive shafts, would be a much taller order. Commissioned in 1994, the Port Royal is the final Ticonderoga-class cruiser, and it contains the last reduction gears of the class. It might be possible to cut reduction gears out of the four mothballed Tico-class cruisers and fit them into the Port Royal, but that would be a very expensive, complicated job, a retired former cruiser captain said.

Katie Roberts, a spokeswoman for Naval Sea Systems Command, would not answer questions about the feasibility of putting another ship's reduction gears into Port Royal. She referred questions to Pacific Fleet. A spokesman for Pacific Fleet said he could not comment on the condition of the Port Royal, or potential repairs, because the Navy hadn't finished its inspection.