On a chilly, dreary Thursday in Philadelphia, a smattering of individuals got here to the waterfront to see the previous Kitty Hawk class plane provider U.S.S. John F. Kennedy (CV-67) start its ultimate journey. Nicknamed “Massive John,” the Kitty Hawk class sub-variant started a visit from the U.S. Navy’s Inactive Ships Upkeep Facility to the International Shipbreaking Limited facility in Brownsville, Texas. There it is going to be minimize up and its remnants offered for scrap.
After 17 years in Philadelphia, Massive John is predicted to reach at its ultimate vacation spot someday subsequent month, a Naval Sea Methods Command (NAVSEA) spokesman advised The Struggle Zone. It can transit south by means of the Atlantic Ocean, across the Florida peninsula, after which throughout the Gulf of Mexico. No date has but been set for the ship’s dismantling.
Massive John and the former USS Kitty Hawk have been offered for a penny apiece in October 2021 after years of debate about their fates. For a quick time this even included talk of returning Kitty Hawk to service and rumors of selling Big John to India. There have been a number of extra grounded however unsuccessful makes an attempt to maintain them from the scrapper’s torch. The Navy set the John F. Kennedy apart for attainable conversion right into a museum ship after it was decommissioned. Multiple groups tried to safe the vessel for that purpose, however none of these efforts proved profitable. Nuclear powered supercarriers can’t be museum ships, so these have been the final alternatives for such a second life for the Navy’s largest warships.
Commissioned on Sept. 7, 1968, the flattop was the primary Navy ship to be named John F. Kennedy and was the final U.S. conventionally powered plane provider constructed. It was retired from service in 2007, 39 years later.
The USS John F. Kennedy on the U.S. Navy’s Inactive Ships Upkeep Facility. (Brian W. Schaller by way of Wikicommons)
The vessel was a one-of-a-kind spinoff of the Kitty Hawk class design initially supposed to be nuclear-powered. It entered service on the peak of the Vietnam Struggle, however didn’t see service there. Nonetheless, it did assist a wide range of different missions, together with the U.S. response to the bombing of Marine Corps Barracks in Beirut, Lebanon, in 1983 and the primary Gulf Struggle in 1991. The provider and its air wing have been referred to as upon to offer fight air patrols after the 9/11 terrorist attacks, and the ship additionally took half within the early levels of the conflict in Afghanistan.
An aerial view from off the port bow of USS John F. Kennedy within the Atlantic Oceano. The ship was deployed to the New York space in response to terrorist assaults on September 11, 2001, in New York Metropolis and Washington, DC. (Picture by Lisa Marcus/Courtesy of the US Navy/Getty Photos) U.S. Navy
That such a big and storied ship – greater than 1,000 toes lengthy and displacing 87,000 tons – was offered for a penny highlights the problem and expense of scrapping such massive vessels. That drawback is simply about to get way more amplified. Scrapping a nuclear powered vessel of comparable dimension is much extra sophisticated and plagued with hazards. By comparability, the online price to dismantle the previous USS Enterprise – the Navy’s first nuclear-powered plane provider – could possibly be as excessive as $1.55 billion, in line with a 2018 Government Accountability Report.
This gained’t be the final flattop to bear the thirty fifth president’s title. The long run Ford class USS John F. Kennedy (CVN-79), the second Ford class supercarrier, was procured in Fiscal 12 months 2013 and scheduled for supply this July, in line with Navy paperwork.
Some Photos of the usJohn F. Kennedy (CVN 79) in the course of the development section at Newport Information Shipbuilding, Newport Information, Virginia, USA.
As of Thursday night, the decaying Massive John was nonetheless near shore within the Delaware River, a sea-going tugboat towing it down the channel to the Atlantic Ocean. In line with NAVSEA, as soon as the ship hits open waters, it gained’t be seen once more from shore till it nears the Texas metropolis of San Padre Island on the Gulf of Mexico.
Right here’s to the Massive John’s legacy and all of the sailors who referred to as her house!
