SAN ANTONIO – The
historic USS Saratoga that once toured in the Vietnam and first Iraqi wars has
now settled in Brownsville after a long and final voyage from Rhode Island.
The decommissioned
aircraft carrier arrived in Brownsville on Friday where it will be dismantled –
for a penny – by ESCO Marine.
ESCO Marine, who
recycles governmental ships, plans to resell pieces of the ship "to
accommodate the level of interest in Saratoga and her history," its
website states. Parts of the flight deck and hull will be refabricated into
plaques and medallions with vessel specification and history engravings.
These little pieces of
history will go on sale in December, and they will be available at the ESCO
Marine Sales facility or online.
The Saratoga is the
second ship this year to be tugged into the South Texas town for scrapping. The
USS Forrestal arrived in February, and is still being dismantled by a separate
company, All Star Metals, an article by The Brownsville-Herald states.
The third ship, the USS
Constellation, will arrive in December after taking the long way around from
Washington state. International Shipbreakers was paid $3 million by the Navy to
scrap the ship because of the long transportation around the Horn of South
America, a separate article by The Brownsville-Herald states.
Saratoga's demise comes
after the Navy was unable to donate the ship to a museum, a press release from
the Navy states.
Though, many Saratoga fans
still exist, and hundreds were there to watch the ship make its last voyage.
At the ship's departure
from Rhode Island, Darryl Fern, a member of the USS Saratoga Association, said
he is disappointed the ship will be demolished, an article by the Navy states.
"It's sad that she
could not be turned into a museum," Fern stated. "Like all the other
older carriers, it's time for her to meet her demise."
The Forrestal-class ship
was decommissioned on Sept. 30 1994 after 38 years of service and 22 deployments,
including the Cuban Missle Crisis. It was the sixth Saratoga ship in U.S.
history, named after the infamous American Revolution battle.
Source: my sanantonio. 19
September 2014
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