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Host Ken Miller sits down with journalist and author, Michael Fabey, to discuss his new book, Heavy Metal – The Hard Days and Nights of the Shipyard Workers who Build America’s Supercarriers. The book chronicles the building of the USS John F. Kennedy, the 2nd Ford-class supercarrier.
Show Notes
Host Ken Miller sits down with journalist and author, Michael Fabey, to discuss his new book, Heavy Metal – The Hard Days and Nights of the Shipyard Workers who Build America’s Supercarriers. The book chronicles the building of the USS John F. Kennedy, the 2nd Ford-class supercarrier. He takes us into the lives and stories of the shipyard workers who build these “cities on the sea” and provides us insight into the revitalization of the American labor movement.
Michael Fabey has reported on military and naval affairs for most of his career. In his work for National Geographic Traveler, the Economist Group, Defense News, Aviation Week, and Janes, he has collected more than two dozen reporting awards, including the prestigious Timothy White Award. His first book, Crashback, provides an account of the power struggle between the U.S. and China in the Pacific.
Creators & Guests
What is From the Crows' Nest?
This podcast features interviews, analysis, and discussions covering leading issues of the day related to electromagnetic spectrum operations (EMSO). Topics include current events and news worldwide, US Congress and the annual defense budget, and military news from the US and allied countries. We also bring you closer to Association of Old Crow events and provide a forum to dive deeper into policy issues impacting our community.
Ken Miller (00:10):
Welcome to From the Crows Nest, a podcast on Electromagnetic Spectrum Operations or EMSO. I'm your host, Ken Miller director of advocacy and outreach for the Association of Old Crows. Thanks for listening. On today's episode, I am pleased to have with me, Mr. Michael Fabey. He is an author and journalist most known for his first book Crashback, which chronicled the power clash between US and China. He is also a journalist who's written on military and naval affairs for many years, about 30 years, in Defense News, Chains, and Aviation Week.
Ken Miller (00:44):
I have him on the show today. We've known each other for about 20 years and he is coming out with a new book, entitled Heavy Metal: The Hard Days and Nights of the Shipyard Workers Who Build America's Supercarriers. It's a fantastic book and I wanted to bring him on the show to talk a little bit about it, and we will provide links on our website for how to purchase a copy of the book that I highly recommend. So with that, Mike, it's great to have you on From the Crows Nest. Thanks for joining me.
Michael Fabey (01:10):
Well, thanks for having me, appreciate it.
Ken Miller (01:11):
We'll dive right into the book a little bit, but just to set the stage, when we talk a lot about military affairs, we oftentimes talk about the technology, the capability, how it works, what you do with it in the field. We oftentimes forget about the people behind it that make the system, that make the platform. And in the case of the supercarriers, it's basically an entire city that comes together to build one platform, one supercarrier.
Ken Miller (01:38):
And in this case, the story chronicles the building of the USS John F. Kennedy. So to set the scene a little bit, and you do a great job at the beginning of the book, talking about the town of Newport News Shipbuilding. What inspired you in looking at that town to write the book and what do you want the readers to know about? This is what it's like to build one of these massive supercarriers?
Michael Fabey (02:04):
Yeah, you put it just right there. So basically a city, the yard within a city and building a floating city that also includes nuclear power plants, an airport, housing for 5,000 people. So it's an amazing undertaking. And I'd have to go back to the very beginning of my reporting career, 30 some years ago. And I went down for a job interview at the local newspaper there at Daily Press, which is located at Newport News, basically right down the road from the yard. And while I was down there, I was driving around, getting a feel of the city, and having grown up in Philly, I had a fairly good idea of what cityscape looks like and everything like that, so nothing like that would really kind of, "Wow!" until I went down the street there, going down by Warwick and everything.
Michael Fabey (02:49):
And all of a sudden, I see this coming up from the port side area, this huge, iconic silhouette of a carrier and it just made me stop. I've just not seen a carrier that close before. And I just see it parked there basically right by the side of river. What is that? And then you realize, well, they build that here. And how did they do that? I was just absolutely amazed at this whole cityscape and you had these people here building it.
Michael Fabey (03:19):
And ever since then, I was just mesmerized by the idea of they could do that and I want to find out more about that. I want to find out how they did that. Having grown up in a blue-collar type of neighborhood, I had that feel within me. I really relate to those kind of folks. And I just wanted to know more about that. So eventually years later, when I'm covering a yard for the local paper and got to know these people and really got an idea of, it's not just an amazing job or amazing life, it's an amazing mindset of what they do.
Ken Miller (03:53):
And it brings together such a diverse group of people, different skills, different crafts, different backgrounds. You go into people coming from different parts of the country that have to come into Newport News for almost the duration of the building of one of these ships. And it's a clash of just about every element you can think of and it's supposed to all work right off the bat with no mistakes, no shortfalls to get this supercarrier built, which of course that doesn't happen, but it's really about the people behind building this that really makes this story very compelling.
Michael Fabey (04:27):
Again, you hit on something that's really key about this. Picture a town, a small city with 30,000 people. Within that, you're going to have people from all different backgrounds, whether they're politics, whether it's religious, thoughts, everything like that and they have that in that yard. They really do. Basically, every skin color, every belief you could imagine, they basically have to leave it all at the gate. When they come in there, they basically have to focus on three major things when they go into that yard. One is to do their job right.
Michael Fabey (05:05):
Why? Because not only does the nation depends on that, but you got 5,000 sailors who lives are going to depend on that carrier working. The second is their own lives. This is the kind of place where your head has to be on a swivel. One wrong move could lose life or limb. And the third thing, just as important as the second, is their workmates. I can't tell you no matter what their personal differences elsewhere when they are out on that waterfront, they all look out for one another in a way that is just truly inspiring, in a way. It's something almost like, well, if they can do that, America can do anything. It really is that kind of feeling.
Ken Miller (05:44):
We talk about culture with the warfighter and the services instilling culture but we oftentimes like stop at the warfighter. But that culture goes all the way down to those who are building the systems and maybe even started by that culture that sets in from the service leadership, in this case, the Navy on down through all the workers that are putting this together. That's where the culture actually starts to bake into these individual platforms that then have to come together for Naval power.
Michael Fabey (06:11):
As the first commanding officer of the Kennedy, Captain Todd ["Sheri" 00:06:16] called Todd Sheri Marzano said something was baked into the steel of the carrier, baked into basically DNA, and that's exactly what this is. This is something that on both sides that is on the shipbuilding side and the Navy side, it goes back even centuries, of this whole idea of from the very beginning, from that keel up and from his first sailors and his plankers was coming in of basically creating something that is going to last and serve this country and just be this icon that is going to be in so many different ways.
Ken Miller (06:47):
Yeah. I had an opportunity to be on the carrier a number of years ago, and it's just an astounding... It's such a huge platform that it's almost like a quarter-mile long, I think. About that. And I don't know all the dimensions of this, but about a quarter-mile long, like a 100,000-ton displacement, stuff like that. And you're just on there and you're just thinking like it started from somewhere and this is the story of where it starts.
Ken Miller (07:12):
This one takes a particular look at the U.S.S John F. Kennedy which is a CVN 79 and it's the second carrier in the Gerald Ford-class, the first one being U.S.S Gerald Ford. And that was, I think, commissioned just a few years ago. And the story of the Kennedy of the CVN 79 is really intertwined with the first carrier, the problems, the successes, and so forth. At the start, could you talk a little bit about the inception of the John F. Kennedy, the CVN 79, and where it was in the timeline with the Ford-class carrier coming out, and some of the challenges and obstacles that it faced right out of the gate?
Michael Fabey (07:58):
Yeah. Even though you want to start with the Kennedy, you really do have to start with Ford. The Ford was going to be this whole brand new carrier. And because of decisions were made back in when Rumsfeld was the secretary of defense, they decided to put all these new technologies on the ship, 23 of them. It was supposed to be something that was supposed to go over a whole four or five different carriers. They said, "Oh, put them all on one carrier." And now, by the way, since this happened to Ford, they said, "No more than two." Gives you an idea of what they were trying to do from the beginning. And as a result, they just had issues with supply chain, issues with development of some of these key technologies, and everything like that going down the line. Some of this technology has nothing to do with the shipyard.
Michael Fabey (08:39):
The new catapult system was developed by General Atomics, things like that. So because of the delays and everything with the Ford, because the cost was so much greater than was anticipated, especially originally because of the decisions that were made administrations ago all eyes were on a Kennedy. They were like basically, you have to get the ship right. If you get this ship right, there's a good chance you get a two-carrier deal, which for a harbor like Newport News that's guaranteed work and workforce for decades. That's a huge deal in a place not only like Newport News but all of Tidewater, that whole region down in that Southeast part of Virginia. If you mess this up, we don't know where the carrier program's going to go. And that's the kind of gun they were under.
Michael Fabey (09:26):
And, oh, by the way, we're going to just make it a little more interesting for you. We want that ship done with basically about 15% less of a workforce. As they call man-hours. That's what they were under, going out to do that. And they just came up with a whole different way of looking at this. They used the shipbuilding expertise that Newport News has going way back, but they brought in these new digital procedures, if you will, digital technologies to help plan and actually even build the ship. So that really helped ramp up things, get things going in the right way. It was still difficult, especially. I'll tell you, they were going to have a real tough time getting that done, and then COVID hit and it was even a tougher time after that. As someone on the yard put to me, you can't Zoom a weld, so they had to build a carrier during COVID. And then a couple workers, more than a couple, but a couple we talked to in the book they almost died. So it was a very tough undertaking.
Ken Miller (10:33):
And certainly with something like a carrier. In the last episode, we were talking about the congressional defense budget and how hard it is to find out what DoD is spending on AW because it's all over the place. But with a carrier, it's very easy to see where the money's going and how long it's taking. So you put all these obstacles on one... All these challenges, let's call them, on one side, and then you put it on a pedestal on the other where it's very easy to see. It's amazing we can even actually get to that point, particularly in the environments that we have to make these decisions. But it's interesting what you said is it really started back with some conversations from some and it cuts across so many administrations.
Ken Miller (11:18):
Why did they think that they could make all these leap-ahead efforts? Like, hey, we're going to do this totally different from anything we've actually had experience before and it's going to be successful. Usually, those types of challenges do go unmet just in business. What made them think or how did that sit with Newport News and with the workers and how did they even reach this point where it seems destined to have trouble?
Michael Fabey (11:51):
It's actually one real simple answer to that. We won the Cold War. I mean, that was it. The whole feeling was we won the Cold War. There's no one out there we have to worry about right now and so we can take the chances instead of being evolutionary, we could be revolutionary. We could take a chance because there's no one we have to worry about. That was the whole line of thinking. And I don't know if that would've worked. It certainly had a chance of working better than it did.
Michael Fabey (12:19):
Newport News said, "If you want us to build a carrier, as long as you provide the systems, we can build a carrier." But then you had 911 happen and that switched everything off. A lot of resources went away and people start eyeing different things differently like carrier costs. But that's what it really came down to, we won the Cold War, they could take a chance on being a revolutionary. Why not? If it takes a little longer, cost a little more, oh, well, no big deal. And I think there was even some thought and if it does well, we need carriers for our Navy anyway.
Ken Miller (12:52):
Now, going from the start of the Gerald Ford to now through the Kennedy, you're talking Bush, Obama, Trump, and now Biden administrations. It's quite a sea change in terms of leadership, no matter how you're looking at it. How did that affect the development of the Ford leading into the Kennedy? And then, of course, we'll get more into talking about the Kennedy.
Michael Fabey (13:17):
I would say at the presidential level, it really didn't affect so much. There were a couple of administrative attempts. In Bush's, for example, say, we're not going to do the big overhauls for the former Nimitz-class carriers. No one was talking about really taking the Ford out, for example, or cut down the Ford-carrier system going forward. They were talking more about let's cut down the carrier fleet size by taking down them as carriers or anything like that. And every time that would happen, there would be a huge meeting with all the members of Congress and then it would go away because the carrier is the best politically engineered program ever invented.
Ken Miller (13:58):
It's in like 300 districts or something. Depends on how you cut it.
Michael Fabey (14:02):
Yeah. It crosses 47 states. No one's going to mess with the carrier that way unless you have something else that can... The last attempt that was made was during the Trump years and they said, "We're going to take out the Truman." And there was such immediate backlash from that, that actually the administration then turned on itself and said, "Okay, we'll put it back in because we're going to fight." And they were fighting themselves really because it was administration's budget. But that's really where it's been at that level. At the presidential level presidents like showing up for commissionings, that kind of thing. Christening sometimes. There's nothing bigger than a carrier. So anyway, I think that's where it stands with that.
Ken Miller (14:48):
So, with the outlook for the Kennedy, and then obviously the Ford, these two carriers really do dictate the future of the US carrier fleet. How many more we can build, how long to keep the legacy carriers in the fleet, and so forth? Let's talk a little bit about the Kennedy. Basically through the book, could you walk us through what were the major phases of the build that you can say these are key milestones that were significant in the production of the Kennedy that you come out in the book in terms of take these 2, 3, 4 periods of time and that's exactly how you see the carrier today.
Michael Fabey (15:30):
So the first few years you're going back right now, 11 years ago, and that's where they get what they call long lead contracts, not to bore everyone, but we really want to make sure this carrier stays in a budget somehow. So we're going to give you some money to order steel. Some of the really big steel components, a big order of machinery and stuff like that. So to get some stuff into the yard, put your placeholder in there and everything like that. And they were doing that for years, even had the first steel cut back around that time. But the first real Kennedy contract wasn't until 2015. That's the first time it was 3.8 billion I think is what it was. Somewhere around there.
Michael Fabey (16:16):
And that's the first time they could actually say, "All right." By that time, I forget the percentage rate off top of my head, but I think it was somewhere around 15%, 20% of the assemblies, as they put there, were already done. And I should explain what an assembly is. So you don't have an assembly line for carriers. So you don't have 20 carriers racked up, but you do have assembly line approach in different parts. The carrier is basically a bunch of metal compartments put together with lots of aerospace between them. So these compartments, there was only 2000 of them all over the ship at different sizes. In each one of those the piping has to be done, the electrical conduits, and stuff you put in there. So they'll have to do it by compartment, by compartment.
Michael Fabey (16:59):
So at the sub-level, you have to go down and build the sub-levels piece by piece by piece. Picture a Lego set, and you're putting together this little Lego part over here. That's an arm we're going to put together arm part. And over here, we're going to put together another arm and over here, the leg, and then eventually you put them all together. Same for the carrier, except for carrier goes from the bottom up and the inside out. After 2015, you'll have the Superlifts become the big milestones. For example, you have a Superlift where you're putting big things as the bow. The bow Superlift is a huge part of, it's a big part of it. One of the biggest things, of course, when put what they called the island, that's that iconic silhouette thing you get with the radars and everything on it.
Michael Fabey (17:45):
When they lift that up and the thing looks like... One of the workers said it was like it was flying through space when the gantry crane puts it on top of the carrier. That's a huge, big deal. The really big thing after that will be the flooding and the launch. The flooding of the dry dock. This carrier sits in this dock, so you have something the size of the Statue of Liberty sitting right there. It's sitting there in this dry dock and then they flood it to make sure that the thing will actually, float in water, basically, and it's all watertight.
Michael Fabey (18:17):
And then the christening, and then the launch will be the big things. That just happened a couple years ago. And now the next big thing for the carrier will be when they commission the ship. But even before that, right now, they're doing this bunch of what they call light-offs. So they're checking electrical systems all about the ship because the ship's been launched, it's sitting at another part of the yard. It floats, so it's like a ship. But now you have to go through and make sure all the systems work like they're supposed to.
Ken Miller (18:43):
So it's still a couple years from even seeing any operational capacity?
Michael Fabey (18:48):
Yes. Absolutely.
Ken Miller (18:50):
You've written a lot on EW over the years in advanced technology so I want to talk a little bit about the weapon systems and the sensor systems on the aircraft carrier. What makes this one or the Gerald Ford-class aircraft carrier from a weapons sensor perspective so much better or advanced than previous carriers?
Michael Fabey (19:09):
And interestingly enough, part of what makes it different actually gets into an EW aspect of it from a defensive side. I don't know if I call it worrying, but it's been noted and addressed. So the carrier has a couple major different systems right off the bat. One is the way it launches recovery aircraft. The first is the EMALS, electronic magnetic launch system. And basically instead of a hydraulic system that gets the generator to rev up a bunch of pressure and shoots out like the popping of a cork, instead it shoots these electronic pulses down, brings the aircraft. It shoots it off the end of the aircraft that way. So with that, you don't have all those big, heavy hydraulic systems. You don't have the maintenance issues or anything like that, and it's easier to maintain, or it's supposed to be. Before it's going to be out there we'll see if that comes true but that's the whole idea of it.
Michael Fabey (20:01):
And it's going to be less costly to maintain. It's a lot lighter than the big hydraulic systems. On the recovery system, same thing. Instead of some of the big hydraulic systems there, you have these twister systems, and again, there's a lot of electronics in there. So those are the two big major systems on this. It's got a new radar system. I don't want to say very cool because that doesn't get you anything but it is a system that is going to be more effective for carrier operations. Let's put it that way. You have a whole new electronic grid system on there that gives a carrier an awful lot more power margin than you ever had before. And this will make it possible to put electronic weapons on a carrier. A laser system, things like that.
Michael Fabey (20:54):
Greater self-defense. And finally, one of the bigger systems is the elevators. Again, it used to be all hydraulics. Well, they took the same launch system, but they turned it instead of horizontal it's vertical and it goes through the decks. It has to lift up whole different deck or floor levels as it goes up and down carrying all major weapons from deep in the ship and all the way up. As a result of all these electronic systems, you now have a whole different electronic signature. 4-4 than you had for Nimitz-class. And this is one of the things that has been [inaudible 00:21:25].
Michael Fabey (21:25):
Will the Ford then be a bigger target because they'll know it is the Ford. But some say, look, we already have protected Nimitz-class carriers with different kinds of electronic dampening and all kinds of things like that. And that puts the whole later approach. But it is something that they've been addressed and looked at. And also you have these electronic systems, I don't want to say interfering with each other, but they definitely have impact on each other. And there's been some noting of that too in recent government reports of late. They're not sure exactly how that's going to be with carrier operations day in and day out.
Ken Miller (22:00):
And that's one of the hard things when you're building a system over the course of a decade and technology is constantly changing and no matter what type of electronics you're going to put on a system like this, you're going to be facing questions of whether or not it makes sense today or there's challenges. But, one of the things that I think that came out if everything goes as planned here on out, one of the things it seems to do is give the Navy a lot more flexibility to maybe adapt its capability during its lifetime. As you mentioned, directed energy and other technologies start to come up from the horizon. Maybe there's an opportunity then to affect what the carrier can do. Whereas the older classes were pretty much set because of size wave power issues. They basically had to do what they were built to do and that was it. I like the flexibility aspect is that an accurate read?
Michael Fabey (23:00):
It is. And this actually gets down to the operational [inaudible 00:23:05]. The reason for being a carrier is to carry aircraft. And the one thing with the new EMAL system is that you can dial it up and dial it down depending on how much power you need to get different systems off. And this will make it possible to put different aircraft carrier on there. For example, smaller UAVs in the future. Right now, you're stuck at a rather narrow margin. And that narrow margin for the current air wing is fine. You're launching Super Hornets, and things like that so you don't necessarily need that ability to dial-up and dial-down, but the future air wing that they're envisioning you probably will. In fact, you definitely will. And this allows you to do that. So the very aircraft that the carrier will be carrying out into future conflicts this will give it a little bit, we're not sure what that carrier has, which could change the calculus for whoever's out there.
Ken Miller (24:02):
You mentioned that in the future, UAVs, direct energy, swarming offensive type of operations. A lot of this is geared towards China. Obviously, this is the big major, at least from a Naval perspective, on the forefront of the Navy's mind in terms of what they're preparing for. To segue into your previous book, Crashback, which is looking at the power struggle between US and China. When you think of an aircraft carrier, we talk about power projection, and I don't think that there's a better example of power projection than a carrier or any Naval vessel, but especially a carrier off the coast or near an adversary and their territory. Dialing into your previous book, Crashback, but also how this new aircraft carrier, this new representation of Naval power in the Pacific eventually really leads to US power projection, and what does that mean for the US and the Navy?
Michael Fabey (25:07):
Take the first part first, which is the whole idea of power projection. You're right. Nothing says we're here like an American aircraft carrier silhouette over the horizon. That is just be all end all and especially in the Western Pacific. Western Pacific is a place where appearance is everything. And the very fact that you'd be out there with a carrier says an awful lot. It just does. That's what our partners like to see, our allies like to see, China hates to see. Space holds, saber-rattling, China's not ready. At least not now and not for the very foreseeable future to do anything about an American aircraft carrier.
Michael Fabey (25:44):
It wouldn't go off the coast of Shanghai, but in the Taiwan Strait, for example, they're going to raise a big fuss, but that's about it. I call it message warfare if you will. The whole idea is, look, these are national waters. We have the right to be here and carriers go out there and that's what they do. So that carrier presence in that part of the world is just key to making sure that we keep our presence there, which is key to keeping trade lanes open, which is key to making sure you get $200 laptops in Walmart, all that stuff. That is what is key.
Ken Miller (26:19):
It's not just military power, it's economic. It powers freedom, it's everything. And the carrier plays a central role in that.
Michael Fabey (26:28):
Our Navy is designed to beat any other Navy. But it's built to make sure that America can keep its trade lanes open for American commerce to take place. That's what it is built for and that's what it was built originally do and that's what it still does now. And with the Ford-class, first of all, and this is nothing to laugh about or just overlook, but the very fact that they're finding these cheaper ways to build a carrier than before because of the way there actually doing to build part of it, that's a big deal. They're a lot more affordable. The fact that you can have different kinds of aircraft going off a carrier, again, is a big deal. We didn't get into this earlier, but they have fewer sailors now aboard the ship. Roughly I think it's like a fifth less sailors, right around there. Certain numbers are still being worked out.
Michael Fabey (27:22):
But that's a huge deal in keeping that ship out there, especially in the Western Pacific. A carrier goes out there huge distances so you want it to be able to make the rounds so to speak. You want it to make the patrols to get around. And again, that's a huge difference. And the fact that you might have these power margins to put some kind of electronic warfare defense system and or weaponry on the ship is a big deal as you go out into those areas. You want that sense that the carrier can take care of itself as well as within a carrier strike group because no carriers can go without a carrier strike group.
Ken Miller (28:00):
So we're basically now two ships into this new class. A lot of organizational challenges, decision-making challenges, leadership, so forth. What are some of the lessons learned after the now U.S.S Kennedy that you hope we have learned as we proceed with what will be the third and more carriers? What are some of the lessons that we need to learn or you hope we've learned through this?
Michael Fabey (28:25):
First of all, nothing is as easy as it seems. That just became apparent as they were going through all this process. The second thing is that while the new digital way of looking at shipbuilding is very important. You cannot overlook in any way, shape, or form to expertise that comes with what they call mastership builders. People who have decades of shipbuilding experience. Who basically when the design of the Ford, even in the electronic schematics said, "Yeah, that's not going to work that way." And they weren't paying attention to it and they had to go back and redesign certain things because of it.
Michael Fabey (29:06):
I think that's some of the key stuff that you really have to look at. And the other, quite honestly, is that this workforce that you have in Newport News is something that really, really needs to be taken care of if you want to continue to build these ships. And they also have our submarines, along with the yard up in Grotony, the electric boat. But if we want to keep this Navy, then we have to make sure that workforce is given its just due. I think that's really important too.
Ken Miller (29:42):
Well, we've done some work on Brack in the past. One of the things we talk about is this intellectual and professional capital that builds up in these centers and the realization that once it leaves, these are people that will go to where they can get jobs. And once they leave, they're not coming back. It's not something that you can just pick up and, "Oh, let's just move it to this part of the country." You have to take care of that because once you lose it, you lose it. It's gone. I think that came out very clearly in the book.
Michael Fabey (30:09):
I would say everyone talks about this bygone era, that he's forgotten the things of the blue-collar worker, and everything like that doesn't really exist anymore. But down at Newport News, it does exist. And it's an amazing thing to see that basically this American muscle taking American steel and building this American warship. That's a whole made-in-America thing is right there. This whole idea of this is what America can do. When you look at some of the things they've had to work through, some of the challenges, hurdles, and obstacles, it is almost the true definition of the word amazing that they get this job done the way they do. And again, risking it so much when they go through and do that.
Ken Miller (30:54):
Is there anything else that you think the listener and the future reader of the book really want to key their interest into or attention to?
Michael Fabey (31:04):
Yeah. And this is a hark it out to a real big cultural thing going right now. The new Top Gun has come out and it's a huge hit everywhere. What I wanted to draw attention to is, what this book has is the real Top Guns. First, on the Navy side, you've got the people who are actually up doing that Tom Cruise stuff. They did it for real. And now they're down there basically helping design and create these carriers that go out to sea. But it's also the Top Guns in this case, are the master shipbuilders. There would be no Maverick, there would be no Top Gun. There would be none of that if it wasn't for these carriers being built this way. Right now, you've got the Nimitz out there, basically a Vietnam War-era ship out there doing this work as it has been doing.
Michael Fabey (31:56):
When we had the three carriers off the coast of Japan recently when Trump was president, Nimitz was just one of those out there. For decades. I don't know many things out there that operate like this for decades that go off on war that are floating cities with nuclear power plants, with hospital services, a housing development. Basically, a floating fort, if you will, a floating Navy base. This is what these men and women do. These steel workers, these shipbuilders do. They are the real Top Guns, if you will, of their craft going out and doing this so you can have a Maverick and you can have a Top Gun, you can have an American Navy and we can enjoy the things we do over here.
Ken Miller (32:42):
Well, thank you so much for taking time to join me. Again, the book is called Heavy Metal: The Hard Days and Nights of the Shipyard Workers Who Build America's Supercarriers. It's from HarperCollins. It was released yesterday, June 14th. We will put a link on AOC's site, how to get it, but obviously, it's available online as well. But I encourage our listeners to pick up a copy. It's a great insight into something that I don't think we really talk about enough and so I really appreciate having you on the show to share it with us.
Michael Fabey (33:17):
Anytime I can get the word about these men and women doing this job and tell their stories. I'm happy to do it.
Ken Miller (33:22):
Thank you very much. That will conclude this episode of From The Crows Nest. I'd like to thank my guest, Mike Fabey for joining me here to talk about his new book, Heavy Metal. As always, I'd like to draw your attention to our sister podcast, The History of Crows that chronicles the history of electromagnetic warfare from the earliest inventors to the latest operations. Also, we always like to hear from our listeners, we're always looking for ways to improve so please visit our website at www.crows.org/podcast, or leave a comment and rate us wherever you download your podcast. Thank you for listening.