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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsFormer Navy carrier - USS Satatoga - on final voyage
(CNN) -- A storied former U.S. Navy aircraft carrier is on its final voyage Friday, a slow voyage from Rhode Island to a scrapyard in Texas.
The former USS Saratoga (CV-60), a part of the Navy's carrier fleet from 1956 to 1994, is being towed down the Atlantic Seaboard by tugboat at about 7 mph, according to a report from the Maritime Executive. The voyage is expected to take about 16 days, the Navy says.
The Navy in May announced it was paying ESCO Marine of Brownsville, Texas, one cent to take the carrier off its hands for dismantling and recycling. The company makes money by selling the metal it salvages from the ship.
Saratoga veterans were among the crowds of people who gathered on Narragansett Bay on Thursday as the ship left Naval Station Newport on its final journey.
"A ship like this shouldn't be taken apart piece by piece," Mitchell Abood, who served aboard the Saratoga from 1985 to 1987, said in an article from the U.S. Naval War College.
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malthaussen
(17,187 posts)That was such a travesty, that the country couldn't find a way to keep her as a monument, especially in view of the states that managed to cough up the dough to preserve battleships named after their states, which made far less contribution in WW2 than the Enterprise. That ship should have remained in permanent commission like the Constitution.
-- Mal
Boom Sound 416
(4,185 posts)Said my Sumner Class Destroyer father
malthaussen
(17,187 posts)Two of the best books I ever read about the Pacific War were about destroyers. Without 'em, there'd have been a lot of sunk battlewagons.
-- Mal
Boom Sound 416
(4,185 posts)Thanks for that.
sdfernando
(4,930 posts)The USS Enterprise (CVN-65) wasn't even commissioned until 1958. It saw service in Vietnam, not WW II.
The USS Enterprise (CN-6) that served in WW II was decommissioned in 1947 and scrapped in 1958 after ten years of failed attempts to raise funds to turn it into a memorial/museum ship.
Cooley Hurd
(26,877 posts)There was a concerted effort to save her back in the late 50's, but the museum-ship-concept hadn't taken off yet (that was more a 1970's thing), so she was torn apart in 1959.
CV-61, the first nuclear-powered aircraft carrier, was commissioned in 1961 and served until 2012. The reason they cannot make her a museum ship has to do with her nuclear powerplant (which makes no sense since both NS Savannah and SSN-571 Nautilus are nuclear-powered museum ships).
Nonetheless, USS Saratoga, CV-60, was slated to be a museum ship at one point, but no one could afford the cost of maintenance. So she's off to oblivion.
Brother Buzz
(36,416 posts)I believe Huell Howser gave me bum information when he was visiting the Essex-class Hornet (CV-12) and mentioned in background, the Yorktown-class aircraft carriers, Hornet (CV-8) and Enterprise (CV-6). He also visited the USS Midway (CV-41). Thankfully, the Midway was a Midway-class aircraft carrier. It's all very confusing to me.
malthaussen
(17,187 posts)Enterprise participated in almost every significant battle in the Pacific War (she missed out on Coral Sea).
There were three Yorktown class carriers, Yorktown (CV-5), Enterprise (CV-6), and Hornet (CV-8). (CV-7, in case you're wondering, was the Wasp, of a different design from the Yorktowns.) Only CV-5 and CV-6 of the class were operational at the outbreak of the war. Ironically, although Enterprise was cut up after the war to make barstools and pinball machines, Yorktown's wreck (discovered in 1998) is still in excellent condition... three miles down.
-- Mal
Cooley Hurd
(26,877 posts)Boom Sound 416
(4,185 posts)We were very proud of her and her crew in 1991.
Farewell.
Tierra_y_Libertad
(50,414 posts)A single memorable voyage from Yokosuka, Japan to Kaohsiung, Taiwan. Imagine, if you will, an idyllic voyage across the South China Sea punctuated by the tail end of a typhoon and several hundred marines puking into coffee cans below decks. Fortunately, they flew us back to Japan.
USS Tom Green County (LST-1159)
Boom Sound 416
(4,185 posts)Cooley Hurd
(26,877 posts)Their design was as close-to-perfect for the mission as any ship-per-purpose in history.
It reminds me of the Douglas DC-3/C-47. Designed 80 years ago and the sob's still doing duty all over the world! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Douglas_DC-3
Wounded Bear
(58,647 posts)USS Forrestal (CV-59)
Forrestal served for nearly four decades in the Atlantic, Mediterranean, and Pacific. She was decommissioned in 1993, and made available as a museum. Attempts to save her were unsuccessful, however, and in February 2014 she was towed to Brownsville, Texas to be scrapped.
Cooley Hurd
(26,877 posts)Given the horror of the 1967 fire, and the fact she was the first "supercarrier", she should've been saved as a museum/memorial.
denbot
(9,899 posts)We watched those films in damage control school, I'll never forget that Chief Petty Officer running with a little fire extinguisher, up to that burning, bomb laden plane as it detonated.
Glassunion
(10,201 posts)Just coat her in blue paint, and emboss the word "Rescue" on the side.