Canada’s Irving Shipbuilding Inc. said on July 5 that former former head of
General Dynamics’ Bath Iron Works (BIW) [GD] Dirk Lesko was appointed president of the company.
Lesko abruptly resigned as president of BIW in April, without any company statement explaining the reason for his resignation. He led BIW from 2017 to 2022 (Defense Daily, April 8).
Ultimately, in May GD selected Charles Krugh, executive of subsidiary Gulfstream Aerospace, to become the new permanent president of BIW (Defense Daily, May 5).
Irving Shipbuilding said Lesko’s appointment is effective Sept. 1.
“We are very pleased that Dirk Lesko is joining us as President. He brings extensive experience in military shipbuilding which will continue to enhance Irving Shipbuilding as Canada’s Combatant Shipbuilder,” Jim Irving, Co-CEO of J.D. Irving, Limited, parent company of Irving Shipbuilding, said in a statement.
The company said Ross Langley, vice Chairman of Irving Shipbuilding, will continue as interim president until Lesko joins the company in September.
Before serving as president of BIW at GD, Lesko previously was vice president of the DDG-1000 program, vice president of surface combatants, general manager, and chairman of the General Dynamics Engineering and Technology Council.
In 2019 the Canadian government chose Lockheed Martin [LMT] to design and be lead contractor to build 15 new Canadian Surface Combatants, based on the BAE Systems’ Type 26 Global Combat Ship. The government also designated Irving Shipbuilding as the shipbuilder to work with Lockheed Martin to produce the vessels, which will replace Canada’s Iroquois-class destroyers and Halifax-class multi-role patrol frigates (Defense Daily, Feb. 8, 2019).