USS Long Beach |
|
| Career (US) | |
|---|---|
| Name: | USS Long Beach |
| Namesake: | Long Beach, California |
| Ordered: | 15 October 1956 |
| Builder: | Bethlehem Steel Co., Fore River Shipyard, Quincy, Massachusetts |
| Laid down: | 2 December 1957 |
| Launched: | 14 July 1959 |
| Acquired: | 1 September 1961 |
| Commissioned: | 9 September 1961 |
| Decommissioned: | 1 May 1995 (deactivated on 2 July 1994) |
| In service: | 0 |
| Out of service: | 1 |
| Reclassified: | as CGN-9 1 July 1958 |
| Struck: | 1 May 1995 |
| Fate: | stricken, to be disposed of in the U.S. Navy's ship-submarine recycling program, 1 May 1995 |
| General characteristics | |
| Class and type: | Long Beach-class cruiser |
| Displacement: | 15,540 tons |
| Length: | 721 ft 3 in (219.84 m) |
| Beam: | 71 ft 6 in (21.79 m) |
| Draft: | 30 ft 7 in (9.32 m) |
| Propulsion: | 2 C1W nuclear reactors; 2 General Electric turbines; 80,000 shp; 2 propellers |
| Speed: | 30 knots (56 km/h) |
| Range: | Nuclear |
| Complement: | 1160 officers and men |
| Sensors and processing systems: |
1 AN/SPS-10 surface search radar[1] AN/SPS-12 search radar[1] AN/SPS-32 bearing and range radar[1] AN/SPS-33 target tracking radar[1] AN/SPS-48 3D air search radar AN/SPS-49 2D air search radar 2 AN/SPG-49 Talos fire control radar[1][2] 4 AN/SPG-55 Terrier fire control radar[1][2] AN/SQS-23 SONAR[1] |
| Electronic warfare and decoys: |
AN/SLQ-32 |
| Armament: | Two twin Terrier guided-missile launchers One twin Talos missile launcher (later removed) One 8-cell ASROC launcher Two 5 inch guns Two triple 12.75 inch ASW torpedo tubes launchers for 8 Harpoon missiles added later two Armored Box Launchers for a total of eight Tomahawk cruise missiles replaced the Talos launcher |
| Aircraft carried: | None. landing pad available for one helicopter |
| Motto: | "Strike Hard, Strike Home" |
USS Long Beach (CLGN-160/CGN-160/CGN-9) was a nuclear-powered guided missile cruiser in the United States Navy. She was the only ship of her class.
Long Beach was the first "all-new" cruiser designed and constructed after World War II (all others were completions or conversions of cruisers begun or completed during the war). She was the third Navy ship named after the city of Long Beach, California, and the last ship built on a traditional "cruiser hull" in the US Navy; all subsequent cruisers were built on scaled-up destroyer hulls. This led to the slogan she carried in her later years: "The Only Real Cruiser."
Contents |
The ship was designed as an "all-missile" ship from the very beginning, but was fitted with two 5"/38 caliber gun mounts amidships at President John F. Kennedy's order. Long Beach was also the last cruiser built on a traditional long, lean cruiser hull; later new-build cruisers were actually converted frigates (DLG/CG USS Leahy (DLG-16), USS Bainbridge (DLGN-25), USS Belknap (DLG-26), USS Truxtun (DLGN-35), and the California and Virginia classes) or uprated destroyers (the DDG/CG Ticonderoga class was built on a Spruance class destroyer hull). The Long Beach was first laid out to be a smaller frigate, but expanded to a cruiser hull due to the ship being slated for the Regulus nuclear cruise missile or, later, 4 launching tubes for the Polaris missile, which would occupy the space taken up by the 5"/38 caliber gun mounts and the ASROC system. The open space just aft of the bridge "box" was to be the area for these.
The ship was propelled by two nuclear reactors, one for each propeller shaft, and was capable of speeds in excess of 30 knots (56 km/h). The high box-like superstructure contained the SCANFAR system, consisting of the AN/SPS-32 and AN/SPS-33 phased array radars. One of the reasons Long Beach was a one-ship class was because it was an experimental platform for these radars, which were precursors to the AN/SPY-1 phased array systems later installed on Aegis warships (Ticonderoga-class cruisers and Arleigh Burke-class destroyers). At the time, Long Beach had the highest bridge of any ship smaller than an aircraft carrier.
The original weapons suite consisted of:
The ship went through several modifications by the time she was decommissioned. The final weapons suite consisted of:
Long Beach was originally ordered as CLGN-160. She was reclassified CGN-160 in early 1957, but was again reclassified as CGN-9 on 1 July 1957. Her keel was laid down on 2 December 1957 by Bethlehem Steel Co., Fore River Shipyard, Quincy, Massachusetts. She was launched 14 July 1959, sponsored by the wife of Craig Hosmer, Congressman from California. She was commissioned on 9 September 1961, with Captain Eugene P. Wilkinson in command.
Long Beach served in the Atlantic Fleet from her commissioning in 1961 until completing her first refueling in early 1966, when the cruiser was transferred from the homeport of Norfolk, Virginia to Long Beach, California.
In May 1964, Long Beach joined the aircraft carrier USS Enterprise (CVN-65) and the guided missile cruiser USS Bainbridge (DLGN-25) to form the all-nuclear-powered Task Force 1. At the end of July, the three warships began Operation Sea Orbit, a two-month unrefueled cruise around the world. It was the first all-nuclear battle formation in the history of naval operations.
In October 1966, the Long Beach deployed for the first of a number of cruises to the Western Pacific. During this initial cruise, the cruiser served primarily as the Positive Identification Radar Advisory Zone (PIRAZ) unit in the northern Gulf of Tonkin. As such, her main responsibility was to "sanitize" returning US air strikes, ensuring that no enemy aircraft were attempting to evade identification by hiding amongst returning friendlies. Additionally, the ship provided support for an on-board Search and Rescue (SAR) helicopter unit. During this tour, the Long Beach was responsible for directing the downing of one Soviet-made An-2 'Colt' aircraft that was attempting to engage South Vietnamese naval units. The shoot-down was executed by an F-4 Phantom II fighter under the control of a Long Beach Air Intercept Controller (AIC). The cruiser returned to Long Beach, California, in July 1967, and was redeployed to the Gulf of Tonkin in 1968, shooting down two MiG fighter planes with her RIM-8 Talos missiles.
After Vietnam the Long Beach performed routine duties in the Western Pacific and Indian Ocean, although in 1975 she served escort duties for an ad-hoc US task force during the Mayagüez incident. In 1980 the vessel rescued 114 Vietnamese boat people off the coast of Vietnam. In 1979, and again from 1980 to 1983, the Long Beach returned to Puget Sound to undergo a mid-life conversion, during which time she was fitted with BGM-109 Tomahawk cruise missiles. The Long Beach deployed throughout the 1980s and provided support during the Gulf War of 1991.
Due to cuts in the defense budget after the Gulf War, the decision was made to decommission all nuclear cruisers from the Navy as their reactor cores ran down. As Long Beach had been refueled during her 1970 refit, her days became numbered in the early 90's and she was scheduled for decommissioning in FY14. A deactivation ceremony occurred on 2 July 1994 at Norfolk Naval Station, and the ship was then towed over to Newport News Shipbuilding where her entire superstructure was removed and her reactors were defueled. After this work was completed in the winter of 1995 the hull was towed through the Panama Canal to Puget Sound Naval Shipyard. The Long Beach was stricken on 1 May 1995, over 33 years after she had entered service. Presently, she is waiting in line to be recycled as prescribed for nuclear powered vessels by Code 350 of Puget Sound Naval Shipyard, Bremerton, WA.
|
||||||||