USS Kitty Hawk (CV 63) Aircraft Carrier: history & decommisioning pictures

[Firehorse]

U.S. Navy - A Brief History of Aircraft Carriers - USS Kitty Hawk ...

http://www.history.navy.mil/danfs/k4/kitty_hawk-ii.html

More pics: http://www.navybuddies.com/cvn/cv63.htm

The VFA-102 “Diamondbacks” introduced the improved F/A-18 E/F “Super Hornet” to the 7th Fleet area of operation, replacing the F-14 Tomcat, after more than 30 years of service. http://www.kittyhawk.navy.mil/About Hawk/About_Hawk.htm

Super Hornets can be identified on this picture by their larger size, bigger leading edge extensions, & angled stabilators.
Click on it to enlarge- the flight deck looks very dirty and worn.
If it's been recently taken, I guess they aren't going to clean, or "scrub" it until it's 100% necessary. It's due to decommision later this year, but they may keep her longer than planned.

http://picasaweb.google.com/gerniko/Intrest_picture/photo#4946357568398163986

Scroll down for KH picture taken by the Russians in 2000
http://air-combat.suite101.com/article.cfm/soviet_and_us_air_combat_19501991

 

[Firehorse]

rumours

There has been talk in North Carolina of docking the retired Kitty Hawk next to the U.S.S. North Carolina (BB-55).
http://rbiii.wordpress.com/

Who's going to pay to tow her around the Cape Horn? Panama Canal is not wide enough, and the route via Suez is too long!

“This is going to take a few years of planning and dedication outside of the fact that we have to raise money,” said retired Navy Capt. Wilbur Jones, a local historian, author and leader in the effort.
The Kitty Hawk is scheduled to be removed from service in 2008 or 2009. After that, it likely would spend a couple of years in a reserve fleet until the Navy decides its future, Jones said.
He said he believed U.S. Navy approval to bring the ship to Wilmington would be one of the group’s lesser concerns. The city already has the battleship, and the Kitty Hawk is named after the Outer Banks locale near where the Wright brothers made their first successful flight, making North Carolina a fitting home, Jones said.
“We are the obvious recipient if the Navy is going to give it away,” he said.

A huge trip
Group members said the Kitty Hawk is slated to be decommissioned on the West Coast. Since it’s too big to go through the Panama Canal, it would have to go around Cape Horn at the southern tip of South America and up the East Coast from the south – a long, expensive journey.

Where it would go once here hasn’t been determined.

A huge ship
The Kitty Hawk is several hundred feet longer and about two-and-a-half times as wide as the Battleship North Carolina.
It is also too tall to make it under the Cape Fear Memorial Bridge, so placing it next to the battleship on Eagles Island likely wouldn’t be possible.
Jones and Willetts have floated the idea that an inlet of some sort could be dug off the Cape Fear River south of the Cape Fear bridge where the two ships could rest side by side.
“If we put it south of the State Port, we’d have to dredge and build piers, that’s for sure,” Jones said. ..

A huge cost
The potential cost is unknown. But acquiring the ship, moving it to Wilmington, purchasing land to move it to, dredging a channel, building a dock and operating it as a museum would all require funding.
Willetts said funding sources would have to be identified.
.. to make it work, statewide support – from the governor on down – would be necessary.
http://www.starnewsonline.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060125/NEWS/60124035/1015/news01

“To start with, it'll cost about $7 million to tow the ship to Wilmington,” Jones said. “We would have to, of course, maintain it. We would have to refurbish it and make it into a museum so that visitors could visit.”
http://www.wral.com/news/local/story/1225520/

 

[webmaster]

Where are the pictures???

 

[contedicavour]

Where are the pictures???

Sent to the Indian Navy and then censored by the Pentagon nfloorl:

cheers

 

[Firehorse]

new old pictures!

More pics here.

http://www.defenselink.mil/photos/newsphoto.aspx?newsphotoid=3267

 

[Firehorse]

Two U.S. aircraft carriers and accompanying vessels have been deployed to the Western Pacific just days before Taiwan’s presidential election amid heightened regional tensions, a U.S. military spokesman told Kyodo News on Thursday.
Aircraft carriers Kitty Hawk and Nimitz are both “conducting scheduled, routine operations in the Western Pacific,” said Master Chief Shane Tuck, a spokesman for the U.S. Pacific Command in Hawaii.
“With the Nimitz, that carrier’s deployment includes its entire carrier strike group. For the Kitty Hawk, only the USS Curtis Wilbur is accompanying that carrier,” Tuck said by telephone Thursday. ..
The Kitty Hawk left its port in Japan on Tuesday, Taiwan’s Defense Ministry said Wednesday, while the Nimitz strike group’s deployment began Jan. 24, Tuck said.
“The vessels are able to respond to any regional contingency any time,” Tuck added. ..The Kitty Hawk is scheduled for a port call in Hong Kong next month and both carriers are expected to remain near Taiwan for the island’s election and the referendums, local media said.
U.S. Pacific Command and Taiwan defense officials declined comment on reports of a port call.
“We usually don’t talk about port visits beforehand because of safety issues, just as we don’t talk about troop movements ahead of time,” said another U.S. Pacific Command spokesperson.
For June Dreyer, former Asia adviser to the chief of naval operations, the timing of the deployments is revealing.
“Although these deployments will doubtless be described as for routine maneuvers, the timing is suspicious,” said Dreyer, now a political scientist at the University of Miami.
The Kitty Hawk, Dreyer said, has a history of deployment to the Taiwan Strait or otherwise near the island during tense periods.
In 1996, the Kitty Hawk was deployed near Taiwan in response to Chinese military exercises preceding the island’s presidential election that year. .. http://www.navytimes.com/news/2008/03/kyo_kittyhawk_031908/

..the USS Kitty Hawk is heading towards Taiwan to "ensure the country's elections go smoothly."
The U.S. military newspaper, Stars and Stripes, said Thursday that the aircraft carrier has left its home port in Yokosuka, Japan, and an unnamed Defence Department official "confirmed the Kitty Hawk will be in the vicinity of Taiwan in the near future." http://www.canada.com/ottawacitizen/news/story.html?id=a43e269a-65d2-4f6c-9128-24908ee458e5&k=48750

Now we know what those refits were for on CV-63! It won't surprise me if it will not get decommisioned as scheduled!

 

[gf0012-aust]

Now we know what those refits were for on CV-63! It won't surprise me if it will not get decommisioned as scheduled!

Considering the quality of Dreyers debate, I have no idea why anyone thought that it was up for a rebirth etc... The ship is shagged. The cost to rebuild is not something that most responsible military BFM's would even remotely consider.

Kitty Hawk has only stayed alive for so long due to Japanese political imperatives. Otherwise they would have replaced her in Yokasuka years ago with a nuke.

As it is, thats becoming less and less of a problem.

 

[AegisFC]

The Kitty Hawk is being decommissioned this fall, the George Washington will take over as the forward deployed carrier.
While the Kitty Hawk was in much better shape than the JFK was it still is showing its age more than the other carriers just because it is forward deployed.

 

[Firehorse]

Navy officials said the Kitty Hawk left its base in Japan en route to Hawaii on Tuesday and would continue on to the U.S. mainland later for decommissioning. http://wiredispatch.com/news/?id=93631

It's only March 20th, so the Fall is 6 month away- a lot of things can happen.
recall the last year of CV-62!

Independence deployed to the Arabian Gulf in January 1998 to support negotiations between the UN and Iraq and to again participate in Operation Southern Watch.
Independence was decommissioned in ceremonies at the Puget Sound Naval Shipyard in Bremeerton, Wash., on 30 September 1998. Independence's commissioning pennant was hauled down 39 years, 9 months and 20 days after it was first proudly hoisted, and the "Don't Tread on Me" jack was transferred to the Navy's next oldest active ship, USS Kitty Hawk (CV 63). http://www.chinfo.navy.mil/navpalib...ries/cv62-independence/cv62-independence.html

 

[Salty Dog]

The Kitty Hawk is being decommissioned this fall, the George Washington will take over as the forward deployed carrier.
While the Kitty Hawk was in much better shape than the JFK was it still is showing its age more than the other carriers just because it is forward deployed.

The George Washington will be on her way to relieve the Kitty Hawk in the next month or two. Any further tasking will go to the GW BG.

 

[gf0012-aust]

It's only March 20th, so the Fall is 6 month away- a lot of things can happen.
recall the last year of CV-62!

So what? There is a vast difference betwen keeping a penant alive due to internal politico-military considerations and trying to flog the hull off so that another navy can do a lazarus.

until they go to the breakers or are gutted for museum pieces, they can be recalled anytime. eg look at the New Jersey, Missouri etc.....

can you NOT continue to try and have the last word to support your commentary without looking at the big picture first.

 

[Salty Dog]

Interestingly, Captain Todd Zecchin the present Commanding Officer of the USS Kitty Hawk was also the final CO of the USS John F. Kennedy.

 

[AegisFC]

Interestingly, Captain Todd Zecchin the present Commanding Officer of the USS Kitty Hawk was also the final CO of the USS John F. Kennedy.

The Kennedy probably counted as shore duty for him so he wanted a command at sea.:

 

[Firehorse]

The aircraft carrier USS George Washington (GW) (CVN 73) with its crew of approximately 3,200 Sailors departed Norfolk, April 7, to begin its journey to Yokosuka, Japan to replace USS Kitty Hawk (CV 63) as the United States' only permanently forward-deployed aircraft carrier.

When will KITTY HAWK leave Japan for the last time?
Based on current information, we are scheduled to depart Japan in late May 2008

It looks like they'll crossdeck, i.e., pierside together and transfer personnel & some cargo, in Pearl Harbor in June-July timeframe- unless something else comes up!

 

[Firehorse]

Kitty Hawk makes historic return to San Diego

Kitty Hawk will sail to Bremerton, Wash., later this month where it will decommission in January 2009.
http://www.navycompass.com/content/view/715/322/

Kitty Hawk changes hands with GW, prepares for decommissioning
http://www.navycompass.com/content/view/714/322/

Her previous crossdecking with CV-62 at PH, HI-
http://www.vaq136.com/carriers/indy40b.jpg

I think they should turn CV-63 into a museum, given her long service and aviation history-connected name!