Welcome to the CavasShips Podcast with Christopher P. Cavas and Chris Servello…a weekly podcast looking at naval and maritime events and issues of the day – in the US, across the seas and around the world. This week…It’s that time of year when Army-Navy football gets a lot of people excited, and in recent years it’s also become the time for some very creative spirit-spot videos. But one video producer has really stood out, producing classics like the Naptown Funk Navy parody and now a new production called Big Decks. It’s one thing to gin up school spirit, but quite another to shine a positive light on an entire service. Producer-writer Rylan Tuohy will be here to dish on the backstory behind his videos and what he thinks about Navy recruiting efforts at large.
Please send us feedback by DM’ing @CavasShips or @CSSProvision or you can email chriscavas@gmail.com or cservello@defaeroreport.com.
This Week’s Naval News:
V-22 Osprey tilt-rotor aircraft again have been grounded under a quote, “operational pause.” First issued by the Air Force Special Operations Command, the Navy followed suit on December 6th. The order followed an unplanned, precautionary landing on November 20 by an Air Force CV-22 at Cannon Air Force Base in New Mexico. Although there were no injuries or damage to the aircraft, initial investigation showed a material failure had not been detected before indications of trouble occurred during the flight. All Ospreys had been grounded for several months following the crash in November 2023 of an Air Force CV-22 in Japan, killing eight service members. The new operational pause affects US Marine Corps, Navy and Air Force V-22s.
For the first time a live ballistic missile defense exercise has been executed from Guam. The US Missile Defense Agency said the Standard SM-3 Block IIA, launched using a vertical launch system on Guam, intercepted an air-launched medium range ballistic missile target off Guam on December 10th. A shore-based TPY-6 radar tracked the target in the first end-to-end use of the radar during a live ballistic flight test. The Japanese destroyer HAGURO and US destroyer MILIUS also took part in the test, which is a major component in developing the new Guam Defense System.
Off the US west coast on December 10th, the Australian destroyer HMAS BRISBANE carried out the first successful Australian test launch of a Tomahawk cruise missile. It is the third new missile system tested from Australian Navy warships during 2024, following launches of the Naval Strike Missile surface-to-surface weapon and Standard SM-6 surface-to-air missiles. All three weapons are programmed to enter service with the Australian Navy.
Back in the Middle East, US Central Command said the US destroyers O’KANE and STOCKDALE successfully engaged and defeated a range of Houthi-launched weapons in the Gulf of Aden on December 9th and 10th. In actions very similar to those carried out by the two destroyers on November 30 and December 1st, the warships shot down multiple one-way suicide aerial drones and an anti-ship cruise missile while escorting three US-owned and flagged merchant ships.
Following the fall of the government of former Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, Israel carried out preemptive strikes December 9th and 10th against most of the fallen regime’s military assets, including devastating attacks on Syrian warships in port. Widely-seen videos seem to show virtually every ship at Latakia and Minet el-Beida sunk or heavily damaged, including nine Osa-class missile boats and 5 Tir-class missile craft. Another six Osas and one Tir based at Tartus do not seem to have been hit in the initial raids, possibly because they were near Russian Navy targets at the former Russian naval base.
The ships and aircraft of the ABRAHAM LINCOLN Carrier Strike Group are returning to their Pacific coast homeports after a five-month deployment to the western Pacific and Central Command operating areas. The LINCOLN operated in the Western Pacific and US Central Command, where embarked aircraft of Carrier Air Wing Nine engaged a number of Houthi targets in and launched from Yemen. The strike group is notable for the first group in the 2000s planned to deploy without a cruiser in the air warfare commander role.
The amphibious ship USS GREEN BAY arrived at San Diego December 9th to transfer homeport from Japan, where the ship was based at Sasebo for more than nine years. The GREEN BAY swapped homeports with sistership USS SAN DIEGO, who arrived in Japan in September.
In new ship news, the fleet oiler USNS ROBERT F KENNEDY, T-AO 208, was delivered to the US Navy on December 10th and placed in service with Military Sealift Command. The ship is the fourth John Lewis-class fleet oiler to be delivered from General Dynamics NASSCO in San Diego, where thirteen more oilers are either under construction or on contract.
And as we reported last week, the US Coast Guard purchased the civilian icebreaker AIVIQ for conversion to Coast Guard use. Although there has been no formal announcement, the ship has been renamed STORIS, given the hull number WAGB 21, and continues to be refitted in a shipyard in Tampa, Florida.
And in Canada, the sixth and final Arctic and Offshore Patrol Ship for the Canadian Navy, the future HMCS ROBERT HAMPTON GRAY, was launched on December 9th at Irving Shipbuilding’s Halifax Shipyard in Halifax, Nova Scotia. Two more variants of the naval AOPS are under construction for the Canadian Coast Guard. And in Vancouver, the future HMCS PROTECTUR, first of two large joint support ships for the Canadian Navy, was officially named December 13th in advance of that ship’s floatoff-launch at Seaspan’s Vancouver Shipyards in British Columbia.
