The Navy received the New Jersey, its 23rd Virginia-class, fast-attack submarine in April 2024. The first fully integrated sub for mixed-gender crews, the New Jersey will join the fleet on Sept. 14, 2024, during a commissioning ceremony. (Ashley Cowan/Newport News Shipbuilding)
WASHINGTON — The first submarine fully integrated for mixed gender crews will join the Navy fleet next week during a commissioning ceremony in its namesake state of New Jersey.
The future USS New Jersey, a fast-attack submarine, will become a deployable part of the Navy’s force during the ceremony at Naval Weapons Station Earle in New Jersey on Sept. 14, culminating five years of construction that represents a historic shift in how Navy submarines are designed.
The New Jersey is the 23rd Virginia-class submarine, but it is the first of its kind — designed from the keel up with specific modifications for gender integration.
“The submarine community is a fully gender-integrated warfighting force,” said Vice Adm. Robert Gaucher, commander of Submarine Forces Atlantic.
Modifications included obvious ones — more doors and washrooms to create separate sleeping and bathing areas — and some that are more subtle — lowering some overhead valves and making them easier to turn and installing steps in front of the triple-high bunk beds and stacked laundry machines.
The design changes were made to accommodate the growing female force of submariners. In the past five years, the Navy has seen the number of officers and enlisted sailors in the submarine force who are women double and triple, respectively, Gaucher said.
As of August 2024, 730 women were assigned to operational submarines — serving as officers and sailors on 19 nuclear-powered, ballistic-missile and guided-missile submarines, and 19 nuclear-powered attack boats, according to Submarine Forces Atlantic.
The increase follows the 2010 lift of the ban that barred women from serving aboard submarines. A decade later, in 2021, the Navy announced a long-term plan to integrate female officers on 33 submarine crews and female enlisted sailors on 14 submarine crews by 2030.
“To support women serving onboard submarines, the submarine force, starting with [the Pre-Commissioning Unit] New Jersey, is building all future [nuclear-powered attack submarines] and the new Columbia-class, [ballistic-missile submarines] gender-neutral from the keel up,” Gaucher said.
Construction on the New Jersey began in 2019 at HII’s Newport News Shipbuilding division in Virginia. The warship was christened in 2021 and delivered in April to the Navy at Naval Station Norfolk in Virginia.
Before construction of the New Jersey, the Navy retrofitted existing Ohio-class submarines with extra doors and designated washrooms.
