USS Durham (LKA-114)
_underway_1989.JPG) The USS Durham (LKA-114) in January 1989 |
|
| Overview | |
|---|---|
| Keel laying | July 10, 1967 |
| Launch | March 29, 1968 |
| 1. Period of service |
|
| Commissioning | May 24, 1969 |
| Decommissioning | February 25, 1994 |
| Whereabouts | sunk as a target ship on August 30, 2020 |
| Technical specifications | |
| displacement |
9,937 tons empty weight |
| length |
175.41 meters |
| width |
25 meters |
| Draft |
7.75 meters |
| crew |
50 officers, 592 sailors |
| drive |
2 steam boilers |
| speed |
20 knots |
| Armament |
4 × 3-inch / 50- caliber guns |
The USS Durham (LKA-114) was an amphibious assault ship of the United States Navy entered service in May 1969 . She belongs to the Charleston class , which consists of five units and took part in missions in the Vietnam War and in 1991 in the Second Gulf War. In February 1994 the Durham was retired after almost 25 years of service and has since been in the reserve fleet in Pearl Harbor . In August 2020 the sinking took place as a target ship .
history
The Durham was laid down on July 10, 1967 as the second Charleston-class unit in the Newport News Shipbuilding yard and was launched on March 29, 1968. The ship was put into service on May 24, 1969. It is named after the city of Durham in North Carolina .
From 1970 to 1975 the Durham was involved in several missions during the Vietnam War. On April 3, 1975, towards the end of the war off the coast of Phan Rang-Tháp Chàm , the ship took more than 2,000 South Vietnamese refugees from small boats, and more followed on April 4. However, the Durham was most famous for its mission on April 29 and 30, 1975 as part of Operation Frequent Wind to evacuate the South Vietnamese capital Saigon .
From the late 1970s, like the other Charleston-class units, the ship was inactive for several years before the class was reactivated in 1982. In the next few years, mainly exercises followed. From January 1991, the Durham again took part in an active mission as part of the Second Gulf War. She was part of a 17-unit Amphibious Task Force , which was the largest fleet in the United States Navy since the Korean War .
On February 25, 1994, after nearly 25 years of service, the Durham was retired and transferred to the reserve fleet of the Naval Inactive Ship Maintenance Facility in Pearl Harbor. The deletion from the Naval Vessel Register took place on August 31, 2015 with the other units of the Charleston class. The Durham was sunk on August 30, 2020 as part of a RIMPAC military maneuver off Hawaii .
The ship received several awards for its missions in the Vietnam War and the Second Gulf War.
literature
- Arnold R. Isaacs: Without Honor: Defeat in Vietnam and Cambodia . Johns Hopkins University Press , Baltimore 1999, ISBN 978-0-8018-6107-9
Web links
- Entry on Durham on navsource.org (English)
- Entry to Durham on navysite.de (English)
Individual evidence
- ^ Arnold R. Isaacs: Without Honor: Defeat in Vietnam and Cambodia . Baltimore 1999, p. 383.
- ^ Bing Xiao: Decommissioned Navy Warship Blasted and Sunk in Pacific Exercise. In: Military.com. August 31, 2020, accessed on August 30, 2020 .