The Arleigh-Burke class destroyer USS Spruance has set a post World War II record for a U.S. Navy destroyer deployment, raising serious questions about the maintenance burden awaiting the vessel. The milestone arrives as the Navy wrestles with delayed repairs, crowded shipyards and billions of dollars in deferred work.

Spruance departed Naval Base San Diego on Nov. 21, 2025, with the USS Abraham Lincoln carrier strike group. The destroyer remained at sea after the carrier group moved on and Lincoln returned to its home port.

As of Oct. 29, Spruance had been deployed for 342 days, far beyond the Navy’s commonly cited seven month benchmark for ships based in the United States. Senior Navy leaders have warned that such extended operations could strain fleet maintenance schedules for years.

The repeated uncertainty has been especially difficult for families waiting at home. Marie Bailey, whose husband serves aboard Spruance, said families have repeatedly heard that the ship would return soon, only to watch those expectations slip.

“We are hearing they’re supposed to come home sometime next month, but we’ve been hearing about ‘next month’ for several months,” Bailey told Military Times. She said families remain worried about their sailors after such a lengthy absence.

Some Spruance sailors also believe their deployment has been overlooked compared with the national attention received by the USS Abraham Lincoln. Two sailors, granted anonymity because they feared reprisal, described the difficult conditions and prolonged separation faced by destroyer crews.

“It’s tight, cramped and just as challenging on the destroyers, if not more than bigger ships,” one sailor said. Another added, “Our boat isn’t as big as an aircraft carrier, but our 300+ families matter to us just as much as anyone else’s.”

Spruance is not the only destroyer facing an unusually long deployment. The expected return dates for USS John Finn, USS Mustin and USS Rafael Peralta have moved from 2026 into 2027, with some deployments planned to exceed 14 months, according to Defense One.

The Navy’s Optimized Fleet Response Plan establishes a 36 month cycle for ships homeported in the United States. The Government Accountability Office describes that cycle as eight months for depot level maintenance, 10 months for training and 18 months for deployment and sustainment operations.

Extended deployments can upset that sequence by delaying scheduled maintenance and reducing the time available for repairs, training and preparation. Private ship repair companies cumulatively took nearly 10,000 days longer than planned to repair destroyers between fiscal years 2015 and 2022, according to a February 2025 GAO report.

The Navy’s surface ship maintenance backlog reached $2.3 billion in deferred work by August 2022. A May 2022 GAO report identified a nearly $1.8 billion backlog in depot level maintenance for Navy ships, including approximately $1.7 billion involving surface ships.

Chief of Naval Operations Adm. Daryl Caudle warned on Oct. 26 that the consequences of extended deployments could reverberate across maintenance schedules for years. He said hundreds of availabilities and hundreds of millions of dollars could be involved as destroyers return to their maintenance periods.

“But this is a years-long recovery,” Caudle said. “There is no workaround on that.”

Rear Adm. Kavon Hakimzadeh, commander of Norfolk Naval Shipyard, also warned about capacity limits as destroyers return from the Middle East. He said shipyards would face choke points while sequencing vessels that may require the same dry docks.

A December 2025 Congressional Budget Office analysis found that maintenance for Navy destroyers and amphibious ships takes 20% to 100% longer than the service plans. Approximately nine years of a destroyer’s planned service life is expected to be spent in maintenance, equal to about one year out of every four.

GAO found that the Navy received nearly $25.9 billion for combat surface ship maintenance from fiscal years 2020 through 2023, approximately $1 billion more than requested. The service reported obligating 99.7% of that money by the end of fiscal 2023.

Budget documents show Spruance’s planned restricted availability shifted from July 3, 2026, through Feb. 21, 2027, to Jan. 19 through April 28, 2027. That moved the scheduled start 200 days later and the planned completion 66 days later.

A September 2024 GAO survey found that 63% of responding executive officers considered underway repairs moderately to extremely difficult with assigned sailors. Another 64% reported similar difficulty balancing sailor led maintenance with classroom training, while 75% reported significant difficulty completing repairs.

The Navy did not respond to Navy Times’ request for comment by publication. Spruance’s eventual assessment and maintenance schedule will determine what repairs are required and how long the destroyer remains unavailable for operations.