Pentagon cuts 2007 MRAP delivery by more than half

Above: A Mine Resistant Ambush Protected (MRAP) armored vehicle is loaded for shipment aboard a C-17 Globemaster for shipment to Iraq in July.

Fewer than half the projected number of blast-resistant vehicles that the Defense Department hoped would be downrange by the end of this year are now expected to be there, a Defense official said.

The vehicles are known as MRAPs, short for Mine Resistant Ambush Protected vehicles, which are heavily armored trucks with V-shaped hulls that deflect blasts from underneath.

In July, the head of the Defense Department’s MRAP task force said he expected close to 4,000 of the vehicles to be made by the end of this year.

“We should have 3,900 in hand by the end of the year and some part of that — it’s my estimate — hopefully more than that 3,500 in theater,” said John Young in a July 18 news conference.

But on Tuesday, a Defense official said the department now expects about 3,000 MRAPs to be made by the end of the year, of which about 1,500 should be in Iraq by year’s end.

Read the rest at Stars and Stripes

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