The award starts the process of purchasing materials required for the carrier’s construction, with the full contract value funded at the time of signing. Work under the agreement is scheduled to continue through March 2039.
Most of the work will be carried out at HII’s Newport News Shipbuilding division in Virginia, the company’s center for aircraft carrier construction. The contract adds CVN 82 to a production portfolio that already includes several Ford-class ships at different stages of construction and testing.
HII is completing delivery and acceptance trials for the future USS John F. Kennedy, the second carrier in the class. Work is also progressing in the shipyard’s dry dock on the third vessel, the future USS Enterprise (CVN 80).
A contract is also being carried out for the fourth Ford-class carrier, which was named Doris Miller. A potential change of the ship’s name to Donald Trump has been discussed in recent weeks, according to the source material, but no decision was reported.
The names USS William J. Clinton for CVN 82 and USS George W. Bush for CVN 83 were approved by the Biden administration and announced in January 2025. The fifth and sixth Ford-class carriers are expected to enter service in the late 2030s.
