| Career | |
|---|---|
| Name: | USS Kingbird |
| Builder: | Quincy Adams Yacht Yard Inc., Quincy, Massachusetts |
| Laid down: | 26 February 1954 |
| Launched: | 21 May 1954 |
| Commissioned: | 27 April 1955 |
| Decommissioned: | date unknown |
| Reclassified: | MSC–194, 7 February 1955 |
| Struck: | 1 July 1972 |
| Fate: | Sold for scrap, 1 March 1973 |
| General characteristics | |
| Class and type: | Falcon-class minesweeper |
| Displacement: | 362 long tons (368 t) |
| Length: | 144 ft (44 m) |
| Beam: | 28 ft (8.5 m) |
| Draft: | 9 ft (2.7 m) |
| Propulsion: | 2 × 600 shp (447 kW) Packard diesel engines, 2 shafts |
| Speed: | 13 knots (24 km/h; 15 mph) |
| Complement: | 39 |
| Armament: | 2 × 20 mm guns |
USS Kingbird (AMS-194) was a Falcon-class motor minesweeper acquired by the United States Navy for clearing coastal minefields.
The second ship to be named Kingbird, MSC-194 was launched 21 May 1954 by the Quincy Adams Yacht Yard Inc., Quincy, Massachusetts; sponsored by Mrs. Marion Cushman Wilson; and commissioned on 27 April 1955, Lt. (j.g.) R. E. Alder, in command.
After shakedown, Kingbird arrived Charleston, South Carolina, for minesweep training and for the entire year she perfected methods of detecting and destroying mines. She also participated in exercises which kept her ready for any service she might be called upon to perform. From 1956 through 1964 Kingbird engaged in minesweeping exercises along the Atlantic coast from Nova Scotia to the Panama Canal Zone in the Caribbean. During 1965 she displayed her versatility in two search operations: one for a downed Navy plane and the other a lost merchant ship. In 1967 she still operated out of Charleston.
Kingbird was struck from the Navy Register on 1 July 1972 and disposed of through the Defense Reutilization and Marketing Service for scrap, 1 March 1973.