Columbia-class: the largest nuclear submarine the US has ever built has barely begun to be assembled and is already 1 year behind schedule — each unit costs $15 billion.

Written by Douglas Avila

Published on 28/04/2026 at 20:34

Updated 28/04/2026 at 20:35

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The United States is building the largest nuclear submarine in its history — and it is already delayed

The United States Navy is assembling at the shipyards in Groton, Connecticut, the Columbia-class (SSBN-826) — a class of nuclear submarines that will be the largest and most expensive the country has ever built.

According to a report by 19FortyFive, published in March 2026, the first submarine of the class — the USS District of Columbia — is already between 12 and 16 months behind schedule compared to the original timeline.

However, the program cannot simply be canceled or indefinitely postponed: the Columbia-class is designed to replace the Ohio-class, which have served as the main platform for American nuclear deterrence since the 1980s. The scale of the program is comparable to projects like the Nevada nuclear tunnel, where the US also spent billions on defense infrastructure.

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The numbers that make the Columbia the most impressive submarine ever designed: 170 meters, 20,815 tons, and 16 nuclear missiles

The Columbia-class will be 170.7 meters long — more than a football field and a half — and will displace 20,815 tons submerged.

Consequently, it will be significantly larger than the current Ohio-class, which were already the largest submarines operated by the American Navy at 170 meters and 18,750 tons.

Additionally, each Columbia will carry 16 Trident II D5 ballistic missiles, each capable of carrying multiple nuclear warheads with an intercontinental range of over 12,000 km.

Similarly, the submarine will be powered by a new generation S1B nuclear reactor that, for the first time in the history of the American Navy, will not require refueling during the entire operational life of the vessel — estimated at over 40 years.

Therefore, once the Columbia-class leaves the shipyard, it will not need to return to port to refuel the reactor — eliminating months of maintenance that the Ohio-class required every 20 years.

In this sense, the “life-of-ship” reactor is one of the most significant technological innovations of the program — and one of the reasons why the cost per unit is so high.

The delay of 12 to 16 months: the largest submarine in the US was already born with scheduling problems

According to analyses by 19FortyFive and the Government Accountability Office (GAO), the first Columbia-class was supposed to be delivered by the end of 2027, but now the forecast is 2028 or early 2029.

On the other hand, the reasons for the delay are multiple: a shortage of skilled labor in the shipyards, supply chain issues for critical components, and technical challenges in integrating the new reactor with the propulsion systems.

Likewise, the shipyards in Groton (General Dynamics Electric Boat) and Newport News (Huntington Ingalls) are overwhelmed — as they need to maintain and modernize the existing Virginia-class submarines while assembling the Columbia.

Consequently, the Navy faces what experts call a “submarine industrial capacity crisis”: the demand for new submarines exceeds the country’s production capacity.

Above all, the delay is not just a scheduling issue — it is a national security issue, because the Ohio-class that the Columbia is meant to replace are aging and approaching the end of their operational life.

Still, canceling or reducing the program is not an option: without the Columbia, the US would lose the submarine leg of the nuclear triad — the quietest and hardest to detect pillar of American deterrence.

Trident II missile being loaded onto a nuclear submarine — Artistic representation — each Columbia-class will carry 16 Trident II missiles with nuclear warheads

The Ohio-class is dying: the race to replace them before they become too old to sail

The 14 Ohio-class submarines were commissioned between 1981 and 1997 and have a projected lifespan of 42 years.

In fact, the first Ohio has already begun to be decommissioned, and the last will go out of service around 2039.

However, the plan is for the 12 Columbia-class to be delivered between 2028 and 2042, at a rate of one per year — which leaves a minimal overlap margin between the retirement of the Ohio and the entry of the Columbia.

As a result, any further delay in the Columbia program could create a vulnerability window in which the US would have fewer strategic nuclear submarines than deemed necessary to maintain deterrence.

Despite this, the Navy claims the program is “under control” and that corrective measures are being implemented to reduce the delay.

Consequently, the Columbia-class has become the most monitored and criticized defense program of the Pentagon — precisely because its failure would compromise the most secretive pillar of the American nuclear arsenal.

The total plan: 12 submarines, $180 billion, and 4 decades of construction

The Columbia program foresees the construction of 12 submarines over the coming decades, with a total estimated cost that could exceed $180 billion — making it the most expensive naval program in US history.

Additionally, each submarine will have a crew of 155 sailors, will operate for over 40 years, and will spend most of that time submerged on secret patrols that can last months without the submarine needing to surface or communicate with the surface.

Similarly, the exact location of each Columbia on patrol will be one of the best-kept secrets of the American government — because the effectiveness of submarine nuclear deterrence depends precisely on the enemy not knowing where the submarines are.

Therefore, the Columbia-class is not just a war machine — they are mobile nuclear vaults that silently navigate the oceans, invisible to satellites and almost undetectable by sonar.

Aerial view of a naval shipyard with a giant nuclear submarine showing scale — Artistic representation — the Columbia-class will be 170 meters long, larger than a football field and a half

The paradox of the Columbia-class: too big to fail, too complex to deliver on time

The Columbia-class is a reminder that even the world’s largest military power faces industrial and logistical limits when it comes to naval engineering megaprojects.

However, the program continues to be classified as “priority number one” by the US Navy — above aircraft carriers, frigates, and destroyers.

The largest nuclear submarine in American history costs more than the GDP of 50 countries, requires technologies that did not exist when it was designed, and is already delayed before touching the water — but it simply cannot be canceled, because without it the US loses the quietest and most feared pillar of its nuclear defense.

The question the Columbia-class poses to the world is simple: how far can technological complexity go before it becomes impossible to meet its own schedule?

Columbia-class: the largest nuclear submarine the US has ever built has barely begun to be assembled and is already 1 year behind schedule — each unit costs $15 billion.

The United States is building the largest nuclear submarine in its history — and it is already delayed

The numbers that make the Columbia the most impressive submarine ever designed: 170 meters, 20,815 tons, and 16 nuclear missiles

The delay of 12 to 16 months: the largest submarine in the US was already born with scheduling problems

The Ohio-class is dying: the race to replace them before they become too old to sail

The total plan: 12 submarines, $180 billion, and 4 decades of construction

The paradox of the Columbia-class: too big to fail, too complex to deliver on time

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Columbia-class: the largest nuclear submarine the US has ever built has barely begun to be assembled and is already 1 year behind schedule — each unit costs $15 billion.

The United States is building the largest nuclear submarine in its history — and it is already delayed

The numbers that make the Columbia the most impressive submarine ever designed: 170 meters, 20,815 tons, and 16 nuclear missiles

The delay of 12 to 16 months: the largest submarine in the US was already born with scheduling problems

The Ohio-class is dying: the race to replace them before they become too old to sail

The total plan: 12 submarines, $180 billion, and 4 decades of construction

The paradox of the Columbia-class: too big to fail, too complex to deliver on time

The Soviet Union spent 22 years drilling into the Earth’s crust and reached a depth of 12,262 meters — they found water where it was thought impossible, hydrogen bubbling from the rock, granite that is 2.7 billion years old, and temperatures of 180 degrees that melted the drill bits.

A German architect built a cylindrical house in 1994 that rotates to follow the sun throughout the day, generates 5 times more energy than it consumes, and was the world’s first energy-positive house.

Gaddafi built the world’s largest artificial river under the Sahara — it’s 4,000 km of giant pipes that pump 40,000-year-old fossil water to entire cities in Libya.

During works to build an artificial island in Indonesia, workers dredged 5 million cubic meters of sand from the seabed and found over 6,000 fossils from a lost continent that submerged 10,000 years ago.

China has just successfully tested the world’s first ground effect maritime vehicle, a craft that flies up to 6 meters above the water at 200 km/h, uses quantum technology and 6G communication, and can rescue patients in the middle of the ocean.

Brazil spent R$ 1.9 billion on a giant bridge to Paraguay, and it is already finished, but no one can use it properly because the access points are not ready, and traffic remains blocked months later.

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The abandoned building in João Pessoa’s most expensive square meter, built in the 1990s, has become a threat to 200 families, has problems with makeshift electrical installations, could collapse at any moment, and faces an urgent demolition request.

A survey by Anbima shows that 20% of bettors in Brazil already treat bets as an investment, spending an average of R$ 284 per month and reinforcing a scenario of greater risk, financial confusion, and less room for wealth accumulation.

Anvisa bans clobutinol in cough syrups after identifying a risk of severe arrhythmia, following a move already adopted by other countries, which have withdrawn the substance from the market due to potentially fatal cardiac effects.