Ari Lawrence, a senior engineer at Huntington Ingalls Industries (HII), claims the company falsified records with the U.S. Navy claiming it had correctly applied a sound-dampening stealth coating on exterior hulls of Virginia-class attack submarines. He alleges HII’s Newport News Shipbuilding facility did not have the appropriate and required qualifications to apply the coating and pressured employees to improperly certify and accept the work performed. As a result, Lawrence claims Virginia-class submarines are “plagued with serious adhesive failures of the exterior hull coating… thereby endangering the crew and national security.” Lawrence also claims HII retaliated against him for raising concerns about these issues. The lawsuit also names as a defendant Northrop Grumman, which spun off HII in 2011.