The Navy awarded a $3-billion contract modification for the detail design and construction of LHA-8, the future amphibious assault ship Bougainville, to Huntington Ingalls Industries.

Last June the Navy awarded HII’s Ingalls Shipbuilding a contract for the work on LHA-8, a new Flight I variant of the America-class LHA that reintroduces a welldeck for surface connector operations. When the contract was awarded then, the Navy released $272.5 million in funding for planning, advanced engineering, and procurement of long lead time material in support of the ship.

This most recent contract action, announced June 16, exercises the contract options for the detail design and construction portions of the work and releases $1.15 billion as a first increment of payment.

“Our shipbuilders do an outstanding job building large-deck amphibious warships,” Ingalls Shipbuilding President Brian Cuccias said in a company news release.

“We look forward to incorporating 50 years of amphibious shipbuilding knowledge into the Navy’s newest assault ship and providing the sailors and Marines a complex and highly capable product to perform their missions of freedom.”

Ship construction is scheduled to begin in the fourth quarter of 2018, and the ship should deliver in 2024, according to the HII news release. Tripoli (LHA-7) is under construction at Ingalls and is set for a ship christening on Sept. 16.