The USS America (CV-66) is a novel chapter in U.S. naval historical past—half Chilly Conflict behemoth, half engineering marvel, and at last the star of one of the crucial weird finales a service ever had. Commissioned in 1965, she was of the Kitty Hawk class, designed to interchange the nuclear-powered USS Enterprise.
However when the Enterprise’s price rose so excessive, the Navy made a practical resolution: assemble America with typical boilers. That selection made her one of many final conventionally powered supercarriers earlier than the transition to all-nuclear carriers.
For greater than three many years, America was a dependable workhorse. She traversed the Atlantic, the Mediterranean, and ventured into the Pacific. In the course of the Vietnam Conflict, her aircrews remodeled 10,000 fight sorties, dropped 1000’s of tons of bombs, and by no means misplaced one among their plane to the enemy, a document that mirrored properly on each the ship and people on board her.
Within the Eighties, she was working off the coast of Libya, the place the Harpoon anti-ship missile had its fight debut. Some years later, in Operation Desert Storm, her jets flew greater than 3,000 missions towards Iraqi forces.
However her responsibility wasn’t just for waging struggle. America was current for humanitarian operations, disaster evacuations, and lots of different missions that necessitated an in a position, versatile vessel. Crew members who served on her recall the never-ceasing hum of the engines, the deafening noise of jets taking off, and the fixed feeling of duty that got here with a job on the flight deck—the place self-discipline and precision have been the one means between an atypical day and disaster.
By the mid-Nineties, the publish–Chilly Conflict drawdown had come exhausting. Whereas her sister ships Kitty Hawk and Constellation acquired pricey life-extension overhauls, America didn’t. She was retired in 1996 and transferred to the Philadelphia Naval Inactive Ships Facility, the place she rested for nearly a decade. Many had hoped she could be saved as a museum, however the Navy had different plans.
In 2005, America was stealthily pulled deep into the Atlantic for a secret take a look at named SinkEx. The concept was to watch how a brand new service would carry out underneath fixed battle injury—and gather knowledge that may form future service designs. For 4 weeks, she absorbed blow after blow: bombs, missiles, underwater explosions designed to simulate torpedo assaults.
To everybody’s shock, America wouldn’t stop. Her double hull and large inside construction absorbed the beating. Even when it was worst, she remained afloat. Finally, Navy crews needed to board her and set demolition fees inside to power her down.
On Could 14, 2005, at 11:30 a.m., she glided under the floor, coming to relaxation upright nearly 17,000 ft down, someplace between South Carolina and Bermuda. She grew to become the most important warship ever intentionally sunk—and the only real fashionable U.S. supercarrier to share that distinction.
The lesson of her last mission was plain: sinking a service with typical munitions is way more tough than most assume, significantly when it’s refueled, weaponed, and manned. America’s sacrifice was taken into consideration within the classes discovered through the constructing of the following carriers, which have been made extra sturdy and higher geared up for the worst.
Right now, the USS America lies deep within the Atlantic. She is gone from the floor, however her story stays—a reminder that there are some vessels not constructed to serve, however to combat to the top.