USS Enterprise (CVN-80)

USS Enterprise (CVN-80) will be the third Gerald R. Ford-class aircraft carrier to be built for the United States Navy. She will be the ninth United States naval vessel and third aircraft carrier to bear the name, and is scheduled to be in operation by 2028. Her construction began in August 2017 with a steel-cutting ceremony.

Naming
On 1 December 2012, during the presentation of a pre-recorded speech at the inactivation ceremony for USS Enterprise (CVN-65), then-Secretary of the Navy Ray Mabus announced that CVN-80 would be named Enterprise. She will be the ninth ship and the third aircraft carrier in the history of the United States Navy to bear the name. CVN-80 will also be the first American supercarrier not to be named in honor of a person since USS America (CV-66) was commissioned in 1966. In December 2016, Mabus chose Olympic gold medalists Katie Ledecky and Simone Biles to sponsor the ship.

Hangar
The CVN-80 has a direct upgrade in hangar space from its predecessor CVN-79, the internal hangar can house up to 50 mid-sized aircraft such as the F-35B, up to 20 mid-sized helicopters such as the Sikorsky HH-60H	and several more large refueling and radar surveillance aircraft.

Construction


CVN-80 is being built by Huntington Ingalls Industries' Newport News Shipbuilding in Newport News, Virginia. CVN-80 is the first aircraft carrier completely designed and built through digital platforms. The first cut of steel ceremony, marking the beginning of fabrication of the ship's components, was held on 21 August 2017, with the ship's sponsors Katie Ledecky and Simone Biles present. Construction began in advance of the purchase contract and construction award, in early 2018. Steel from CVN-65 will be recycled and used in the construction of CVN-80. As of August 2022, approximately 20,000 pounds of steel from CVN-65 has been salvaged and recycled for inclusion into CVN-80, with another 15,000 pounds still to be processed, for a total of 35,000 pounds. Enterprise will also incorporate four portholes taken from CV-6, her World War II predecessor. Enterprise will replace USS Dwight D. Eisenhower and is scheduled to be launched in November 2025, with a planned delivery date of March 2028. This date has since slipped to September 2029, citing suppliers’ slow recovery from production disruptions caused by the Covid-19 pandemic. |https://news.usni.org/2024/03/15/aircraft-carrier-enterprise-delivery-delayed-by-18-months-says-navy |

The ship's keel was laid, with no specific ceremony, on 5 April 2022, three weeks ahead of schedule. The shipbuilder held an official keel-laying ceremony on 27 August of the same year.