The Navy’s first Columbia-class submarine is back on schedule to deliver by 2028, nine months ahead of schedule, the program executive officer (PEO) for Strategic Submarines said Feb. 11.
This program update comes after the Navy and industry implemented an acceleration plan that put all the modules to the final assembly shipyard by the end of last year.
The PEO, Rear Adm. Todd Weeks, confirmed the future USS District of Columbia (SSBN-826) is now about 65% complete and highlighted the Navy worked out a plan with industry a year ago to accelerate and get all the pieces of SSBN-826 delivered faster than previously planned.
“This time last year we sat down with our shipbuilding partners and we realized that we were not where we needed to be on the District of Columbia, we were not making the progress we needed to be making and the trendlines were not heading in the right direction,” Weeks said during a panel at the WEST 2026 conference, sponsored by the Armed Forces Communications and Electronics Association (AFCEA) and the U.S. Naval Institute. “So together with our shipbuilders we embarked upon a bold plan that we called the A26 acceleration plan.”
The acceleration plan aimed to get every module that makes up SSBN-826 to General Dynamics’ (GD) Electric Boat’s final assembly yard in Groton, Conn., by the end of 2025. The final piece, the submarine bow section, arrived in Groton after being shipped from Huntington Ingalls Industries’ (HII) Newport News Shipbuilding division facility in Virginia the week before Thanksgiving 2025.
“That was a nine month acceleration to where we were in January [2025],” when the production plan previously expected to have the bow delivered in June 2026, Weeks said.
Weeks argued this was a “monumental endeavor and it built a lot of momentum in the program that we’re continuing to carry on today.” He said this means by the end of 2026, SSBN-826’s modules will all be assembled into one pressure hull complete ship.
In an October earnings call, GD Chairwoman and CEO Phebe Novakovic said SSBN-826 was at that time about 60% complete and beyond planning for the modules to be together by the turn of 2026, they were otherwise trying to improve schedule delays with the Navy.
Previously, in 2024 the Navy estimated SSBN-826 would be delivered in fiscal year 2028, 12 to 18 months later than originally planned following late deliveries from component suppliers earlier in the process.
However, last June then-acting Chief of Naval Operations Adm. James Kilby told senators the District of Columbia was on pace to be delivered a full two years late, in March of 2029, not including testing and certification processes.
At the time, Kilby said he was optimistic they could shorten that timeframe but admitted the the Navy was “trying desperately to claw back that schedule.”
The Navy wants SSBN-826 to be ready to start patrolling by fiscal year 2031 in order to stand in for the first retiring Ohio-class submarines.
Weeks also provided updates on the follow-on Columbia-class boats, saying the future USS Wisconsin (SSBN-827) is about 35% complete and is one of two Navy ships under construction that are on track to deliver on schedule. The third submarine is 10% complete and three more ships are under advanced construction, he said.
The PEO also reiterated that beyond the submarines themselves, the Navy is building out the facilities to support the submarine, starting with Naval Submarine Base Kings Bay, Ga., and then Naval Base Kitsap-Bangor as well as developing the digital sustainment model to best maintain the ship.
Weeks noted the Columbia-class boats will be the first submarine digitally designed and digitally sustained. “So we are in the process of developing that sustainment model that will impact not just the crew, the sailors that sail on that ship, but also the refit facility that will maintain the ship as well as the training facility and all of the other support functions that are out there,” he added.
Exchange Monitor affiliate Defense Daily first published a version of this story.