Kinda sad tonight...

thanks John! yeah I've looked into the Pima museum... definitely gonna have to check it out! we have the lone star flight musuem down here that is growing.. the main thing with it is that about 90% or more of the aircraft are operational and participate in fly overs and air shows through the year!

Ran across this thread and let me asure you, most of the folks who serve out on the open water form the same attachments to their ships as you did. I served aboard the Knox class frigate USS Fanning (FF-1076) and the New Orleans (LPH-11) . New Orleans is being held in reserve for eventual disposition as a museum. I'd heard the city of New Orleans was interested. As for the Fanning, when the Navy dumped the Knoxes in 93 she was "leased" to Turkey, and eventualy sold outright to them on 2000. In 2001 they decommissioned her and sent her off to be cut up for scrap. It is though I was informed of the death of a friend I hadn;t seen in many years. There are still nights (I got off the ship in 1976) when I dream of walking her decks, feeling the roll of the hull in the flat calm of the Indian Ocean, the midnight moon reflecting off the still waters. She was much more than steel and aluminum to me, she was a home, a sheltering presence, and the backdrop against which I grew up. I read a comment from a USS Ramsey (FFG-2) crewmember on the occasion of her sinking as a target during RIMPAC exercises, "it was like watching someone go out and shoot your old dog". We lost so much when the Navy downsized after WWII, The Enterprise, Saratoga, all the old dreadnaught battleships that survived Pearl Harbor. More recently they let go to the torch the Henry B. Wilson and the Harold Holt that pulled the steamer Mayaguez back from Cambodia. While I fully appreciate that we can't preserve everything it seems to me that we are all too willing to shread significant momentos of our past. When nothing is left of that past it is all too easy to forget......and perhaps repeat. One of the saddest photos I can remember is the last page of the Squadron book on Essex aircraft carriers. It shows the USS Bunker Hill, the last unconverted Essex, being towed out of San Diego on the way to the scrappers, past the Rosecrans National Cemetery. That was in 1973. Wish we'd had the foresight to save her. What a monument to the airmen and sailors of WWII she would have made. Rest well old friends, you are not forgotten.

Hey! New to this forum thing. Was checking this thread out and talk about old memories flowing. Yes, for whatever reasons, MY ol' girl "Connie" CV-64 will always be a big part of me. She was decommished 2004. I was unable to attend the ceremony and I'm still and wil be kicking myself in the butt for years to come for not seeing her and saying good-bye for the last time. Sob,Sob Anyway, I was a grapeape and served below-decks(and I mean just about everywhere below-decks, even on that BIG boat). Even did some flight deck duty. There were lots of so-called bad times. But as the years go by, they are turning more into good if not great times. Last I heard was that they might sink her for artifical reef or something like that. That news hit me hard.
As a kid, I said I would be on a aircraft carrier someday(sailor or civilian). And I've always wanted a totally detailed, museum quality model of one. My skills will never reach that level. But am enjoying the hobby anyway. The ultimate model is one that will handle a full or almost full airwing of 1/72 aircraft. This kind of model is one where a whole room must be added to the house just for it. I have a dream!! someday... someday... Anyway, sorry for the rambing on. This thread just struck a cord with me. Thanks for the memories grapeape

tears are welling in my eyes everytime i hear or see apiece of history get destroyed or scrapped just a month ago i saw wwII T-2 tanker get hauled out to sea for the last time
so i pulled over my bigrig over along the river got out and paid silent omage as it passed on its way to forever i wish i had a camera that day but it will live in my memory
forever . remember those who don't save and remember history today , are doomed to repeat it tomorrow!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I have the same feelings when I see pics of the USS Long Beach. What's lef t of her is up in Washington with the rest of the nuke cruisers waiting for final disposition. It really hurts when you spend some of the best years of your life and have to see what others do to it.

Read in the paper that the US Navy plans to tow the USS America(CV-66) out of the Philly Yard and sink her somewhere east of Norfolk during a weapons test in late April or early May.
Since they have never sunk a super carrier, they want to see what it takes to do so and how the ship will sink.
This is just a note for those interested

Wow didn't realize there was still activity here... I totally dropped the ball on getting the Guam plans to trumpeter but someones question in the odds and ends reminded me of it.  I came back to get the email address of the guy I was talking to and had to read through the whole thing again.

Glad to see some of the new crowd come aboard!

I just heard they are going to sink the Oriskany as an artificial reef this week. I saw this post a couple of days ago and meant to post that reminded me. Then I saw where grape ape mentioned the same fate for the Connie IMHO that Sucks The Connie deserves better but I guess it's the way of the world. I was with VF-154 on board the Connie from 87' til she went into SLEP. She was in better shape going into SLEP than her replacement was coming out. Had many good times because of her and I still miss her She's a grand lady.

I remember as a kid back in 70 walking the Flt Deck of the USS Hancock CVA-19 during open house at NAS Alameda back when my uncle Ernie served aboard as a crewman. I was in awe of the aircraft aboard & in Aug or Sept  of 1977 while in Long Beach visiting my great uncle Bob who worked on an oil rig supply boat across  from the Hanna when they were crapping her. Man, that broke my heart somewhere I have a pic of it.

While the USS Oriskay met her fate this morning about 200 miles south of Penscloa Beach in 200 feet of water to make an artifical reef. Former crew members watched from chartered boats. 500 Pounds of explosives were used to sink her

*Bows Head and offers a moment of silence in salute.*

I used to live in Jacksonville Florida and frequently saw corsairs and crusaders being chopped up and dumped into the water.   about 10 years ago, I dove coast of NJ and there were M60 tanks and subway cars under water.  It was sad to see how these mighty machines end up like that, but I can't imagine what was going through the minds of people who served on those big ships when they were sinking into the water.