Building Aircraft Carrier USS Enterprise Took Less Than 4 Years. Taking Her Apart Will Take Nearly 18. The US Navy Spent $902,000,000 Just Making Her Safe Enough to Sit at a Pier, and Another $111,000,000 Keeping Her There While It Decided What to Do.

Building Aircraft Carrier USS Enterprise Took Less Than 4 Years. Taking Her Apart Will Take Nearly 18. The US Navy Spent $902,000,000 Just Making Her Safe Enough to Sit at a Pier, and Another $111,000,000 Keeping Her There While It Decided What to Do.

GAO warned in 2018 that the job was closer to decommissioning a nuclear power plant than breaking up a ship, priced the public-shipyard route at up to $1.55 billion, and said work wouldn't start until 2034. So the Navy went commercial. A losing bidder took it to court, the judge called the Navy's decision arbitrary and capricious, and the rebid came in $118 million cheaper. She now gets towed to Mobile, where crews will cut up 93,000 tons of ste…