Navy budget cutters are about to achieve what flood and fire could not: sink the Dolphin submarine.
Less than a year after completing a $50 million project to repair and upgrade the San Diego-based research vessel, the Navy will decommission it Sept. 22. It is the country’s last diesel-electric sub.
Axing the Dolphin will save the cash-strapped Navy about $18 million annually, said Capt. John Schwering, director of the Navy Range Office in Washington. The Navy’s budget this year is $125 billion.