Air Force Depot Maintenance: Privatization-in-Place Plans are Costly While Excess Capacity Exists

Abstract

DOD annually spends about $15 billion or about 6 percent of its $243 billion fiscal year 1996 budget on depot maintenance work that involves the repair, overhaul, modification, and upgrading of aircraft, ships, ground vehicles, and other equipment. Over $4 billion is spent on Air Force systems and equipment. Most of the Air Forces depot maintenance work is performed at five depots that are located at its five air logistics centers. Since the early 1970s, we and others have reported on the redundancies and excess capacity that exist in DOD depots and the need to downsize and improve the operational efficiency of these depots. These problems have been exacerbated in recent years by reductions in military force structure and related weapon system procurement; changes in military operational requirements due to the end of the Cold War; increased reliability, maintainability, and durability of military systems; increased maintenance performed in operational units; and increased privatization of depot maintenance workloads.

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Document Details

Document Type
Technical Report
Publication Date
Dec 01, 1996
Accession Number
AD1179618

Entities

People

  • Eddie W. Uyekawa
  • James F. Wiggins
  • John D. Strong
  • John G. Brosnan
  • John M. Schaefer
  • Jonathan M. Silverman
  • Julia C. Denman
  • Karl J. Gustafson
  • Larry J. Junek
  • M. G. Knoepfle

Organizations

  • United States Government Accountability Office

Tags

Communities of Interest

  • Ground and Sea Platforms
  • Human Systems
  • Space
  • Weapons Technologies

DTIC Thesaurus Topics

  • Acquisition
  • Aerospace Industry
  • Air Force
  • Air Force Facilities
  • Base Closures
  • California
  • Commerce
  • Congress
  • Contracts
  • Department Of Defense
  • Infrastructure
  • Logistics
  • Maintenance
  • Maintenance Personnel
  • National Security
  • Naval Aviation
  • Supply Depots
  • Turbines
  • United States

Fields of Study

  • Engineering

Readers

  • Economics
  • Logistics and Supply Chain Management.