Sunday, December 21, 2008

They're Sinking My Ship

OK...Scrapping It, But With The Same End Results


I was Googling my way around the WWW this morning and happened to start looking at some story about mothballed Navy ships, and that lead me to check on what ever happened to my old ship, the USS_New_Orleans_(LPH-11) .




Turns out she's still around, but has been decommissioned and is scheduled for scrapping soon. She was even a movie star some time later after I left, serving as the stage for part of the movie Apollo 13 since her sister ship the USS Iwo Jima had already been decommissioned and scrapped.

I never will forget standing watch in her smelly stinky 110 degree F engine room back in 1978, or watching the sun set across her stern as we sailed past some of the thousands of little uninhabited islands in the Philippines.

I know we can't possibly keep every 40 year old ship sitting around rusting, but it's sad to see a place you lived and worked and grew up a little on going away.

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