engineering from broad management and policy
planning within NAVSEASYSCOM. NAVSEC has six
field divisions strategically located across the United
States. The following paragraphs summarize their
responsibilities.
The Norfolk division is responsible for shipboard
installation and maintenance engineering. This includes
research, development, testing, and evaluation
(RDT&E) for shipboard electronic equipment and
systems and for the small craft program. this division
also provides marine and mechanical engineering
technical assistance to the operating forces.
The Philadelphia division is responsible for
RDT&E; installation; and quality assurance and
maintenance engineering on shipboard hull, main
propulsion, mechanical, electrical, and auxiliary
systems, equipment, and components. This division
also provides technical assistance to operating forces
and field activities in the operation and maintenance of
the systems listed in this paragraph.
The Great Lakes division provides technical
representation for NAVSEC to provision electronic
equipment. The division also provides engineering
services to the electronic supply office for shipboard
electronic equipment and systems.
The Mechanicsburg division provides engineering
support to the Ship’s Parts Control Center (SPCC) for
hull, mechanical, and electrical systems and equipment
under NAVSEA’s control.
The San Diego division is the west coast
counterpart of the Philadelphia division for hull,
mechanical, and electrical matters, and of the Norfolk
division for electronic matters.
The Port Hueneme division is responsible for
system design, procurement, installation, and test of
range instrumentation and special-purpose ships; and
the development of design and installation data for
government-furnished equipment required for ship
design and test.
NAVSEC’s responsibilities lie in “total ship
engineering.” This means they are concerned with a
ship from concept through inactivation. NAVSEC is
organized into two departments: the Ship Material
Department and the Ship Systems Engineering and
Design Department.
The Ship Material Department plans, programs,
initiates, and coordinates action to procure new
equipment and restore and repair material on hand. To
help them, the field divisions at Great Lakes and
Mechanicsburg also provide logistical support.
The Ship Systems Engineering and Design
Department is the larger of the two departments and is
the heart of NAVSEC. It is charged with nearly all naval
architecture and engineering functions and it tasks
NAVSEC’S other four field divisions. The department
distributes its functions among four in-house divisions
and five staff offices. First, we will explain the roles of
the divisions, and then of the five staff offices.
The Ship Concept Design Division does all
preliminary and conceptual design work in the
development of new ships. At the same time, the Hull
Division handles the structural aspects of these ships,
including weight control, stability assurance, mine
defense, and systems integration.
The Machinery Systems Division is responsible for
the propulsion systems of new ships and those now in
the fleet. It also handles the Navy’s distillate fuel
project, the pollution control program, life support
functions, and underway replenishment systems.
The Command and Surveillance Division has
become more important as we plan for a smaller but
more mobile fleet. It will work to meet heavier
operational requirements by advancing the state of the
art in electronic warfare systems.
The five staff offices under COMNAVSEC perform
the following functions:
The Materials Development Office develops the
materials required for naval service in the marine
environment.
The Engineering Services Office implements
quality assurance, human engineering, shipboard
manning, and computer-aided ship design and
construction (CASDAC) techniques.
The Technical Administration Office monitors the
department’s program formulation and review project.
The Ship Safety, Damage Prevention, and Control
Office develops engineering criteria, standards, and
policies on safety, damage control, and ship protection
in the design of total ship systems.
The Fleet Support Office is responsible for
NAVSEC’S role as the strong technical right arm of
NAVSEA’S Fleet Maintenance and Logistics Support
Directorate, its staff, and the ship logistic divisions.
These NAVSEA managers in the Fleet Support Office,
with help from the fleet, receive, investigate, evaluate,
and define the problems that demand Headquarters’
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