Navy brings vast intranet online

Norfolk, Va.- The Navy ushered in its new era of information technology at Naval Station Norfolk Monday against a backdrop of aircraft carriers and destroyers. Electronic Data Systems Corp. opened the first of six network operation centers designed to keep information moving reliably on the Navy Marine Corps Intranet (NMCI). NMCI is the Navy's 5-year, $4.1 billion-effort to outsource the technology, maintenance and help desk support for more than 350,000 desktops and 200 networks. EDS was awarded the contract in October 2000. Sen. John Warner, R-Va., presided over a ceremony celebrating the center's opening. Warner highlighted NMCI's security benefits. "Cyberterrorism is just as dangerous as a torpedo amid ships," said the veteran of World War II and the Korean War. Warner said that NMCI would have no trouble receiving continued congressional funding "as long as it remains on track, on cost and meets its milestones." When NMCI has problems, he said, "we'll overcome them." The network operations center is located inside Naval Station Norfolk's mammoth Fleet Industrial Supply Center, which is an above-ground bomb shelter. The building also houses a massive server farm containing $30 million worth of equipment and a help desk that will support up to 210,000 users on the East Coast. The network operations center will support a total of 67,000 users. When fully staffed, EDS will employ 600 support personnel at the location. The network operations center consists of four tiers of computers facing a wall of large screen monitors that display how the NMCI network is performing. One half of the network operations center is dedicated to ensuring the smooth flow of unclassified information. The other half is a secure area where analysts from Raytheon Corp. work to keep classified data moving around network bottlenecks. Navy Capt. Chris Christopher, the deputy program executive officer for NMCI, said the Navy is currently creating an inventory of all its applications and consolidating them. Members of the project, Task Force Web, have found 22,000 applications in use within the Navy, some very old and outdated. The task force has reduced the number to 8,000 and will eventually eliminate even more. "The network means nothing without applications," said Joe Cipriano, the Navy's program executive officer for information technology.