War demands put crimp in Navy's air, sea time

Being popular has its price.

The recent surge in global demand for all things Navy has caused the service to burn through its funding more quickly than planned.

As a result, the service is tightening its belt for the rest of the fiscal year, which translates into fewer hours in the air and fewer days at sea.

"At the current rate of operations, if we didn't make adjustments, the fleets would run out of cash," said Lt. Cmdr. Phil Rosi, a spokesman for U.S. Fleet Forces Command in Norfolk.

Ships and planes already on deployment or preparing to deploy will be least affected by the cuts. There are currently about 100 ships deployed worldwide, including four carrier strike groups and their air wings.

The cuts are being driven by recent higher-than-projected expenses, Rosi said. These expenses are because of increased demand from combatant commanders around the world, as well as the increased costs of operations.

The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are still the Navy's main priorities, along with homeland defense, Rosi said, so they will continue to receive the bulk of funding. Non-deployed planes and ships will bear the brunt of the cuts, though the specifics are still being worked out.

Airplanes will see fewer flight hours, which means less fuel usage and lower maintenance costs. The Navy is also reviewing upcoming participation in air shows and flyovers.

For non-deployed ships, steaming days will be reduced by an average of one third. This means fewer ships will participate in community events such as Fleet Week. Last fiscal year, the Navy did 112 port visits. This year, it's looking to do about 70.

While these are all great ways to showcase the Navy, Rosi said, "the key is to be operational."

What these cuts will mean specifically depends on what you drive.

On the air side of the house, Lt. Cmdr. Joseph Cuba predicts squadrons may be scheduling more simulator time, particularly once Carrier Air Wing 8 returns with the carrier Theodore Roosevelt.

Cuba helps run the F/A-18 Hornet and Super Hornet simulators at Oceana Naval Air Station as part of Strike Fighter Wing Atlantic. He said the simulators are already at capacity since they're primarily used to train new pilots. Two new Super Hornet simulators are coming on line soon, which will handle some of the excess demand.

Cuba said that while pilots can use the simulators to stay sharp, simulator time doesn't count toward many of the requirements they must meet to keep current in their planes.

As the technology gets more sophisticated, the Navy is studying whether, and how, to allow simulators to substitute for cockpit time, he said.

Paul Harris, a retired Tomcat maintenance officer who now works with the simulators, said that while the simulators are useful, "the realism is not there."

The trick is balancing what's live with what's simulated, said Rear Adm. David Anderson, vice commander of U.S. Fleet Forces.

"We look at funding levels and figure out how we can continue to operate safely," he said. "There are red lines we can't go below. We have to make sure everyone knows where the red lines are."

Harris remembers coming back from deployments in the 1980s, and sidelining planes for months to save money. The problem, and expense, came when it was time to get the planes and pilots ready for the next deployment.

The same issue is at hand now, Anderson said.

"We have to say, 'Here's the cost if we park them.' We have to get up to speed again."

When it comes to non-deployed ships, the answer may lie in the Internet - more specifically in fleet "synthetic training."

In a synthetic event, while a ship is tied up at the pier, trainers feed a real-time war game into its displays, communications systems and combat systems. Multiple ships and planes can participate simultaneously from anywhere in the world.

In the past five years, the technology has "gone from Pong to Xbox" in terms of sophistication, said Michael Ogden, assistant chief of staff of synthetic training and technologies with Strike Force Training Atlantic.

The Navy currently uses synthetic training along with live exercises as part of a typical work-up for strike groups and individual ships preparing to deploy, he said. The exercises can run for days at a time and offer scenarios that would be hard to mimic during live training.

To compensate for the loss of time at sea, Ogden said the Navy is looking at ways to do more synthetic training this summer "to keep the muscle memory alive" for the crews of lower-priority ships.

It is too early to know what form the training will take or how many ships will be involved, he said. Since preparing a synthetic event usually requires nine to 12 months, he said it's likely the trainers would adapt part of an existing exercise instead of starting from scratch.

Looking ahead, Rosi couldn't put a number on what it would cost the Navy to resume normal operations, nor say what the service might request in a supplemental request or the 2010 budget, which is due out in about a month. The current fiscal year ends Sept. 30.

"We're not in a position to talk about what may happen in the future," he said. "We will continue to monitor operations throughout the year, and if additional funding comes available, we'll adjust."

Matthew Jones, (757) 446-2949, matthew.jones@pilotonline.com