From the May 19, 2020, East Bay (Massachusetts) Times "Snapp Shots: Closed USS Hornet too great a treasure to be lost" by Martin Snapp.
The aircraft carrier USS Hornet (CV-12) was slated to be scrapped on September 2, 1995, the 50th anniversary of the end of World War II. This was the second aircraft carrier by that name. The first one (which had launched the famous Doolittle Raid) was sunk in battle during the war and this aircraft carrier was renamed from the Kearsarge in the former's honor. It participated in the rest of the war and continued service to its country, even picking up those first astronauts to land on the moon on their return to earth back in 1969.
She was towed across San Francisco Bay for the occasion and afterwards, those in attendance decided she would be better as a museum ship, which she became. The USS Hornet Sea, Air and Space Museum formally opened on October 17, 1998, in Alameda, California.
This was not the first ship in the U.S. Navy to be saved from destruction. An earlier one was the famous USS Constitution, veteran of the Barbary Wars and War of 1812.
--Brock-Perry
No comments:
Post a Comment