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CLASS - FORRESTAL
Displacement 56,000 Tons, Dimensions, 1039' (oa) x 129' 1" x 37' (Max)
Armament 8 x 5"/54, 100 Aircraft.
Armor, Unknown.
Machinery, 260,000 SHP; Geared Turbines, 4 screws
Speed, 33 Knots, Crew 3800 - 4280.
Operational and Building Data
Ordered as a "Large Aircraft Carrier", hull number CVB-59. Contract awarded to the Newport News Shipbuilding and Drydock Co., Newport News, Va., 12 Jul 1951. Laid down 14 Jul 1952. Reclassified as an "Attack Aircraft Carrier" (CVA-59), 1 Oct 1952. Launched 11 Dec 1954 and commissioned 1 Oct 1955.
Reclassified as a "Multi-purpose Aircraft Carrier" (CV-59), 30 June 1975. Modernized at the Philadelphia Naval Shipyard Jan 1983-May 1985 under SLEP (Service Life Extension Program).
Reclassified as a Training Carrier and redesignated AVT-59, Feb 1992; Forrestal arrived in Philadelphia 14 Sept 1992 to begin a 14-month complex overhaul prior to assuming the duties as training carrier. In early 1993, however, it was decided to decommission Forrestal and leave the Navy without a dedicated training carrier. Decommissioned and stricken from the Navy List, 11 Sept 1993.
On 14 Sept 1998 ex-Forrestal was towed from the former Philadelphia Naval Shipyard, Philadelphia, PA, at 0400, by USNS Powhatan (T-ATF 166) enroute to Pier 1, Newport Naval Station, Middletown, Rhode Island. On 18 Sept 1998 ex-Forrestal arrived and was moored with her port side moored to the south side of Pier 1, Newport Naval Station, Middletown, Rhode Island. (Thanks to Ken Killmeyer, USS Forrestal Association Historian.)
Update, 22 October 2013: "The Navy awarded a $0.01 delivery order Oct. 22 for dismantling and recycling ex-USS Forrestal (AVT 59)."
"The delivery order was made under an indefinite-delivery, indefinite-quantity contract to All Star Metals for the towing, dismantling and recycling of conventionally powered aircraft carriers stricken from the Naval Vessel Register." (Read the complete note from Naval Sea Systems Command Office of Corporate Communication.)
Update, 31 January 2014: "The decommissioned carrier Forrestal, the first of the Navy's 'supercarriers' and a technological marvel when it was launched in the 1950s, will begin its final journey on February 4th when it is towed out of Philadelphia for a trip to Brownsville, Texas, where the ship will be dismantled and recycled." Read the complete story at the San Diego Union-Tribune website.
Update, 5 February 2014: Statement released by Senator John S. McCain (R-AZ) on the last voyage of the ex-USS Forrestal.
Read the latest updates from All Star Metals LLC, re the arrival of ex-Forrestal in Brownsville, TX.
Status:"AVT 59 has been scrapped by All Star Metals LLC on December 15, 2015. Certificate of scrapping, demilitarization and HazMat disposal is on file."
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