| Author |
Message |
    
Michael H. Standart
Moderator
Username: mstandart
Post Number: 11403
Registered: 12-2000
| | Posted on Saturday, December 16, 2006 - 8:28 am: | 
|
From the Navy Times on line:
quote:The mother of all Spruances now sleeps with the fishes.
The destroyer Spruance, first of the 31 DD 963 Spruance-class destroyers, sank in the early hours of Dec. 8 after serving the previous day as a target for aircraft-launched Harpoon missiles, according to the Navy.
P-3C Orion and F/A-18 Hornet aircraft from Carrier Air Wing 8 and Patrol and Reconnaissance Wing 5 launched the missiles, said Lt. Mike Kafka of the Norfolk-based Second Fleet.
The sink exercise — or “sinkex” — took place in rough weather in the Atlantic Ocean about three hundred miles off the Virginia coast, Kafka said.
For the rest of the story, go to http://www.navytimes.com/story.php?f=1-292925-2427006.php
Comment: These ships were the hottest thing when I signed up, and referred to as "Venerable" when I retired with a few already sent to the mothball fleet. While it's a somber end, it's kind of fitting for a warship, and better I think then having the sandcrabs ripping her guts out on the scrapyard.
A photo study of this ship in happier times can be viewed at http://www.navsource.org/archives/05/963.htm
Since this website is subject to frequent updates, it's possible that photos of the SINKEX may appear in the near future
Cordially,
Michael H. Standart
Equal Opportunity Curmudgeon
|
