USS Savannah (AOR-4)

For other ships of the same name, see USS Savannah.

USS Savannah
Career
Name:	USS Savannah
Builder:	General Dynamics Corp., Quincy, Massachusetts
Laid down:	22 January 1969
Launched:	23 April 1970
Commissioned:	5 December 1970
Decommissioned:	28 July 1995
Struck:	29 October 1998
Honors and awards:	1 battle star & Meritorious Unit Commendation (Vietnam)
Fate:	Transferred to the Maritime Administration for disposal
General characteristics
Class and type:	Wichita-class replenishment oiler
Displacement:	40,100 long tons (40,743 t) full
Length:	659 ft (201 m)
Beam:	96 ft (29 m)
Draft:	35 ft (11 m)
Propulsion:	3 × boilers, steam turbines, 2 × shafts, 32,000 shp (23,862 kW)
Speed:	20 knots (37 km/h; 23 mph)
Complement:	22 officers, 398 enlisted
Armament:	• 2 × Phalanx CIWS • 1 × Mark 29 Sea Sparrow missile launcher
Aircraft carried:	2 × CH-46 Sea Knight helicopters

USS Savannah (AOR-4), was a Wichita-class replenishment oiler of the United States Navy. The fifth Savannah was laid down on 22 January 1969 by the General Dynamics Quincy Shipbuilding Division at Quincy, Massachusetts, launched on 23 April 1970, sponsored by Mrs. Ralph L. Shifley, wife of Vice Admiral R. L. Shifley, Deputy Chief of Naval Operations, and commissioned on 5 December 1970, Capt. Bernard P. Williams, Jr., in command.

Service history

1970–1974

Following shakedown out of Guantanamo Bay, Savannah proceeded to her homeport at Norfolk, Virginia. Arriving on 12 May, she completed post-shakedown availability on 9 August, and prepared for deployment to the Mediterranean.

Savannah departed Norfolk on 20 September. En route to Rota, Spain, she refueled ships participating in a Caribbean exercise. After reporting to the 6th Fleet on 8 October, Savannah operated in Task Group 60.1. By the end of the year, she had replenished 178 ships.

Savannah continued to operate with the 6th Fleet in the Mediterranean until early March 1972. On 9 March, she headed west for Norfolk and arrived there eight days later. Her stay in the United States, however, was cut short by the exigencies of the Vietnam War. On 25 April, she exited the Chesapeake Bay and, four days later, transited the Panama Canal. Savannah arrived in Subic Bay, Philippines, on 20 May and began a five-month tour replenishing the fleet along the coast of Vietnam. She made six line swings to the Gulf of Tonkin during this time. Each swing was punctuated by a 4-6 day load out period in Subic Bay.

Savannah departed Subic Bay on 5 November, bound for Norfolk. She transited the Panama Canal on 4 December and arrived at Norfolk on the 8th. Savannah operated out of Norfolk, along the Atlantic seaboard and in the Caribbean, for almost all of 1973. On 3 December 1973, she again headed eastward to join the 6th Fleet in the Mediterranean. From 12 December until late May 1974, she supported units of the 6th Fleet on-station in the Mediterranean. On 3 June 1974, she re-entered Norfolk.

[1974-1995]

Decommissioning and sale

Savannah was decommissioned on 28 July 1995, at Philadelphia, and was laid up in the National Defense Reserve Fleet, James River, Fort Eustis, Virginia. The ship was struck from the Naval Register on 29 October 1998, and transferred to the Maritime Administration for disposal. On 27 January 2009, the Department of Transportation signed a fee for service contract worth $515,726 with ESCO Marine of Brownsville, Texas, to scrap ex-Savannah.

The scrapping of the Savannah was featured on the television show Break It Down which aired on 8 July, 2010 on the National Geographic Channel. Extensive footage of the ship was featured, chronicling the struggles with removing toxic items like asbestos prior to salvaging and cut up.

Awards

Savannah earned one battle star and a Meritorious Unit Commendation for service in the Vietnam War.

References

• This article includes text from the public domain Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships. The entry can be found here.
• Photo gallery of USS Savannah at NavSource Naval History

External links

• USS Savannah website
• Wildenberg, Thomas (1996). Gray Steel and Black Oil: Fast Tankers and Replenishment at Sea in the U.S. Navy, 1912-1995. Annapolis, Maryland: Naval Institute Press. http://www.ibiblio.org/hyperwar/USN/GSBO/index.html. Retrieved 2009-04-28.