Hi everyone; it’s Kevin. Today is Wednesday, August 11th. On June 1st of this year, Eric Snider joined Electric Boat as Vice President of the Columbia Program. Eric came to us from General Dynamics Applied Physical Sciences, which he joined in September of last year. Before joining APS, Eric served for 34 years in Naval Reactors. In his last position in NR, he reported directly to Admiral Caldwell as Program Manager for the Virginia Program. So Eric, welcome to the podcast. Let’s share with our listeners a bit more about your background.
Thanks Kevin, I appreciate the opportunity to introduce myself to the EB Community. I feel like I’ve grown up here a bit over my 34 years. It’s great to be here.
I grew up in a small town in North Carolina near Greensboro. I went to college in Raleigh at NC State— go Wolf Pack. My first year was 1982 and that was the year that the “Cardiac Pack” made the run all the way through to the championship in men’s college basketball. I even got to meet and sort of know Jimmy Valvano there too, so that was an interesting artifact of being there at that time.
And a legend of the men’s game for sure…
Absolutely! After graduating and going to work in D.C. for Naval Reactors, I met and married my wife Theresa. She’s from Chicopee, Mass., so we managed to put together the South and the North there. We later had two daughters who are both in college now. I did spend 34 years at Naval Reactors living in the D.C. area in northern Virginia. We moved to Gales Ferry last August and we love, absolutely love, being in southeastern CT.
Well we love having you here. You’ve got a unique background and a detailed understanding of submarine construction and maintenance and project management that I think is already accelerating EB’s performance. Let’s talk about your priorities—you’ve had what, two whole months now to soak on all EB has to offer, so let’s talk about those priorities.
My first priority is people. I think the shipyard and what we do here is a national treasure and a linchpin in our national defense. My number-one priority is to help steward and take care of the people that make that happen. Critical to that people priority is safety—I know that’s your priority as well—and I am evermore committed to trying to make sure that we hold each other accountable and that we are generating the safest workplace we can for everyone.
Finally, I’ll say as the vice president of the Columbia program, priority is to deliver USS Columbia 826 in April of 2027. I want to lead the program office to be the bridge where necessary to get the whole shipyard team to make that goal, and we have to do that together. We don’t win individually as the program office or as the engineering department or even as the waterfront, we get there together. So I want to help lead the whole team to achieve that goal.
I couldn’t agree more; you’re absolutely right. Shipbuilding is a full-contact team sport; there is no question about it. It takes all 17,000, almost 18,000 of us now working together from the earliest days in design right through material procurement, planning and then of course the execution on the deck plate. There isn’t any job insignificant here in a shipyard. It’s going to take all of us working together.
I want to talk a little bit about something that just happened here on July 31st when we christened PCU 795, the Hyman G. Rickover. We were fortunate to have the Admiral’s widow, Mrs. Rickover, take part in our keel-laying ceremony for the boat back in 2018, but sadly Mrs. Rickover passed away just a few weeks before the christening on July 5th. She served as the ship sponsor for the first Rickover, the 709 boat. You have a unique perspective given your time in Naval Reactors because you knew Mrs. Rickover. Tell us a little bit more about her.
I met Mrs. Rickover several years before but interacted with her most in the preparations actually leading up to that keel laying for 795. I got to spend quite a bit of time talking with her. In describing her, I’d say most importantly in her own right, she was an accomplished professional before meeting and marrying Admiral Rickover. She was a Navy nurse and she was his second wife; his first wife had passed away before they got married. She was absolutely devoted to the admiral, and not in the wait-on-him kind of way. She was certainly no shrinking violet. I think they shared values that led her to believe in him and his pursuits and him in hers as well. Especially education; I got to travel with her once to the magnet school in Chicago named for Admiral Rickover. To see her there interacting with the children, and her interest in making sure that all was being done for the betterment of their education, was inspiring in its own right.
She always wanted to talk about what I’ll call the more humanitarian or coach/mentor side of the admiral. Though I never met the admiral, and didn’t know him, from folks I worked with at Naval Reactors, who did work directly for him, it was clear that on days such as you and your wife had a baby, or if people got married, or even on your birthday, you might find a personal note from the admiral sitting on your desk letting you know he recognized significant life events. That’s not a side of him that you hear much about. He was certainly dedicated to the hard work that we have to do to deliver nuclear powered submarines as we do. That’s difficult and requires demanding standards. He did have a little bit softer side, and she talked about that as often as she could.
Thanks for sharing that Eric; it’s not something that we often get to hear much about. Since the christening, we’re making great progress on Rickover down on the pontoon in Graving Dock 3, so we’re hoping to get float-off here in the next couple of days.
I didn’t have the opportunity to meet Mrs. Rickover, but from your own account it’s clear that she was a very special woman. We learned at the sponsor’s dinner and at the ceremony itself, she was a dedicated sponsor to the sailors who served on the 709 boat and a tireless preserver of her husband’s legacy, as you indicated. Thank you for sharing that and for taking the time to introduce yourself to the EB team today and talk about your priorities for Columbia.
Thanks everyone; we’ll talk soon.
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