Overhauling the USS Abraham Lincoln: a complex challenge | With Video & Photo Gallery

The sailors on the USS Lincoln are doing much of the work as the ship goes through it's 25 year refit and refuel.

NEWPORT NEWS When Edward Shields joined the Navy 10 months ago, the recruiter didn't mention jackhammer duty.

But last week, the young Navy airman stood aboard the aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln, bending his 6-foot-5-inch frame in a cramped passageway, blasting apart floor tiles and making a great deal of noise while doing it. He is part of a 35-sailor team that has pulverized 372,000 square feet of tile since the Lincoln arrived at Newport News Shipbuilding last March.

These sailors normally work on the carrier flight deck. They launch, recover and refuel jet aircraft, and their jobs are considered among the most exciting and dangerous in the world.

Now they're in downtown Newport News.

Living the adventure.

"No, he never told me about jackhammer work," Shields laughed, recalling the recruiter's pitch. "I never thought I'd be doing this."

It might not be exciting, but Shields is participating in one of the military's most complicated fix-up jobs. The Lincoln is at Dry Dock 11 for a Refueling and Complex Overhaul, or RCOH. It happens midway through the 50-year life of a nuclear-powered aircraft carrier, and pulverizing old floor tiles is among thousands of jobs.

A 2002 study from the RAND Institute said a RCOH "may be the most challenging engineering and industrial task undertaken anywhere."

During its first year at Newport News, a milestone marked on March 28, workers had already reinstalled the long-range radar tower, blasted and primed the ship's hull below the water line, refurbished 230 of 399 watertight doors and completed port and starboard rudder repairs.

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Overhauling the USS Abraham Lincoln: a complex challenge | With Video & Photo Gallery