USS Harrisburg (LPD 30) Completes Builder's Sea Trials

Ingalls Shipbuilding, a division of Huntington Ingalls Industries (HII), completed builder's sea trials for the future USS Harrisburg (LPD 30), the first San Antonio-class amphibious transport dock ship built to the Flight II configuration. Over several days of testing, shipyard personnel evaluated propulsion, steering, onboard control systems, communications, mission systems, and combat systems integration. The ship returned to the shipyard having met its main testing objectives and is now preparing for acceptance trials.

Sources differ on the delivery timeline. HII expects to deliver the Harrisburg to the U.S. Navy before the end of the year, while the Navy's April budget documents had projected delivery for April 2027. Maritime Executive, meanwhile, noted that commissioning is expected in the summer of 2027 and cited a September 2024 Government Accountability Office (GAO) review that placed the program about 15 months behind its original schedule, something it described as consistent with other Navy shipbuilding programs.

Stephen Janowski, Ingalls Shipbuilding's amphibious ships program manager, described the trial results as a critical step toward delivering the ship to the fleet and as a testament to the quality of the shipbuilders' work, adding that LPD 30 will provide the Navy and Marine Corps with an enhanced capability for generations to come. The Harrisburg measures approximately 208 by 32 meters, with a well deck capable of carrying a utility landing craft or two LCACs, and a flight deck and hangar that can accommodate helicopters and the MV-22 Osprey tiltrotor aircraft. Her keel was laid in January 2022, she was launched in Pascagoula, Mississippi, in October 2024, and christened in January 2025. Ingalls is the sole builder of the San Antonio class and has already delivered LPD 17 through LPD 29.

In addition to the Harrisburg, Ingalls has two other Flight II ships under construction, the Pittsburgh (LPD 31) and the Philadelphia (LPD 32), and is in the early acquisition and planning stage for the upcoming Travis Manion (LPD 33), LPD 34, and LPD 35. For LPD 32, a distributed shipbuilding approach is being applied, under which Eastern Shipbuilding Group will manufacture six modules at its Florida shipyard for delivery in the second half of 2027, in what its president and CEO, Joey D'Isernia, described as a demonstration of the strength of the Gulf Coast naval industrial base.