Guardians,
On Sunday, 28 February, our second National Security Cutter (NSC), WAESCHE, arrived in its homeport of Alameda, California. WAESCHE is in "In-Commission Special" status and will be making final preparations for the commissioning on 07 May 2010.
Before arriving in Alameda, WAESCHE rendezvoused with BERTHOLF, the first NSC. Both crews gathered on their flight decks to form their respective hull numbers.
The WAESCHE's crew, and all the people who support them, have done an incredible job getting the ship to this point in its construction. That success is a reflection of the crew's hard work and our revised acquisition procedures that enabled us to incorporate lessons learned from BERTHOLF. WAESCHE achieved the Authority to Operate classified and unclassified systems one year sooner than BERTHOLF and reduced the number of trial cards by 50 percent following acceptance trials. To lower the number of construction hours, we reduced the number grand blocks and hull assemblies from 32 on BERTHOLF, to 29 on WAESCHE, and only 14 for STRATTON, the third NSC.
Those are clear signs of a learning organization and a change-centric culture.
To the WAESCHE crew: welcome home and I look forward to seeing you in May!
