USS Spruance (DD-963)

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For other ships with the same name, see USS Spruance.

USS Spruance in Mayport on 21 June 1994
History
United States
NameSpruance
NamesakeRaymond A. Spruance
Ordered23 June 1970
BuilderIngalls Shipbuilding
Laid down27 November 1972
Launched10 November 1973
Acquired12 August 1975
Commissioned20 September 1975
Decommissioned23 March 2005
Stricken18 March 2005
Identification
MottoWisdom, Fortitude, Reason
Nickname(s)
  • The Spru-Can
  • Spru
FateSunk as target, 8 December 2006
Badge
General characteristics
Class and typeSpruance-class destroyer
Displacement8,040 (long) tons full load
Length529 ft (161 m) waterline; 563 ft (172 m) overall
Beam55 ft (16.8 m)
Draft29 ft (8.8 m)
Propulsion4 ×
gas turbines
, 2 shafts, 80,000 shp (60 MW)
Speed32.5 knots (60.2 km/h; 37.4 mph)
Range
  • 6,000 nautical miles (11,000 km; 6,900 mi) at 20 knots (37 km/h; 23 mph)
  • 3,300 nautical miles (6,100 km; 3,800 mi) at 30 knots (56 km/h; 35 mph)
Complement19 officers, 315 enlisted
Sensors and
processing systems
Electronic warfare
& decoys
  • AN/SLQ-32
    Electronic Warfare System
  • AN/SLQ-25 Nixie Torpedo Countermeasures
  • Mark 36 SRBOC Decoy Launching System
  • AN/SLQ-49 Inflatable Decoys

Armament
Aircraft carried2 ×
SH-60 Seahawk
LAMPS III helicopters.
Aviation facilitiesFlight deck and enclosed hangar for up to two medium-lift helicopters

USS Spruance (DD-963) was the

launched by Mrs. Raymond A. Spruance.[1] Spruance served in the U.S. Atlantic Fleet, assigned to Destroyer Squadron 24 and operating out of Naval Station Mayport, Florida
. Spruance was decommissioned on 23 March 2005 and then was sunk as a target on 8 December 2006.

History

1960s

Bath Iron Works, General Dynamics and Litton Industries submitted proposals for production of DD-963 on 3 April 1969. Of the $30 million assigned, $28.5 million has been provided to three contractors.[2] Eventually, Litton's bid won the competition.

1970s

Spruance was the first of a highly-successful class of

antiship missiles
.

Spruance's first operational deployment was in October 1979 to the

LM2500 Gas Turbine Main Engines and had to replace the engine while deployed. This was done successfully in port.[citation needed
]

Spruance, being the first gas-turbine powered ship in the U.S. fleet, had an underway replenishment breakaway flag (flown while pulling away from receiving supplies and fuel from a logistics ship at sea) that was a replication of the large yellow warning seen on the side of aircraft carriers, with red block letters saying "BEWARE JET BLAST" on a large yellow background. Upon "breaking" (unfurling) the flag on the halyards, they would play the theme song from the 1976 film Rocky as they increased speed and sailed ahead of the logistics vessel.[citation needed]

1980s

Spruance entered her first major overhaul in 1980 at the Norfolk Naval Shipyard. During a brief shipyard period in 1983, she received the Phalanx CIWS and the TAS Mk 23 radar system.[citation needed]

USS Spruance alongside USS Ticonderoga on 8 October 1983

Spruance steamed to the Arabian Sea in 1983 including a port visit to Mombasa, Kenya, in May 1983. She briefly took station off Beirut in June 1982 before being relieved. In 1982, she transited both the Suez Canal and the Panama Canal during the same summer.[citation needed]

Spruance deployed for a six-month period in January 1983 to the

Rota, Spain, followed by a liberty port visit in Palma, Spain. Additional stops in the Mediterranean consisted of a brief stop in Augusta Bay, Sicily, then to Souda Bay, Crete, for a maintenance period (IMAV) with USS Shenandoah. Spruance passed through the Suez Canal on 29 June.[citation needed
]

Admirals Vern Clark and Gary Roughead (who would later go on to become the 27th and 29th Chiefs of Naval Operations, respectively), were Spruance's commanding officer and executive officer, respectively, from 1984 to 1985.[citation needed]

On 26 January 1989, Spruance ran aground on a reef while traveling at 3 knots (5.6 km/h; 3.5 mph) near Andros Island in the Bahamas.[3] The incident occurred during anti-submarine training exercises in the deep-water trench east of the island. Navy tugs and the USS Boone re-floated the ship, which suffered $1.8 million in damage to the hull, propellers, sonar dome, and forward mast. A Navy report faulted a junior officer who had conduct at the time of the incident, Lt. W.T. Hicks, finding that he ignored the advice of the quartermaster who advised against a course change that would take them closer to the reef.[4] Hicks was discharged from the Navy following the grounding. Neither the ship's skipper, Commander Travis W. Parker Jr., or the Executive Officer, Commander J.M. Braeckel, were on the bridge at the time of the maneuvers that led to the grounding.

1990s

Upon arrival in the

Massaua, Eritrea, to Aqaba. As the ship was empty, it was allowed to proceed toward its destination.[citation needed
]

Spruance was relieved as flagship by USS Hayler on 9 October after having completed more than 170 boardings, and then started her transit homeward through the Suez Canal on 11 October. Once back in the Mediterranean Sea, the ship made port calls in Toulon, France; Alicante, Spain; and Rota, Spain. She returned home on 14 November.[citation needed]

In July 1994, as part of

U.S. Coast Guard ships needed an assist from U.S. Navy ships in the region to handle the volume. Among these was Spruance which took onboard nine hundred Haitians for the transit to Guantanamo Naval Station.[citation needed
]

Spruance transferred to Portsmouth, Virginia and entered drydock after the deployment.

In mid-1996, Spruance took part in the 24th annual U.S. invitational maritime exercise in the Baltic Sea, the BALTOPS 96 exercise. Made up of air, surface and subsurface operations, the exercise involved 47 ships and aircraft from 12 different squadrons sent by 13 NATO-member and Partnership for Peace nations: Belgium, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Germany, Lithuania, Latvia, Netherlands, Poland, Russia, Sweden, United Kingdom, and United States.[citation needed]

Spruance steamed in the Mediterranean from April through October 1997 with the

Ukrainian military and diplomatic distinguished visitors during the 1997 Ukrainian Independence Day celebration. During that period, Spruance also took part in the Partnership For Peace Exercise "Sea Breeze 97" in the Black Sea. Sea Breeze 97 trained military forces on how to provide humanitarian relief for victims of a simulated earthquake in Southern Ukraine.[citation needed
]

In the fall of 1999, Spruance detached from the John F. Kennedy carrier group to relieve

Atlantic and entered the Mediterranean with other ships from the John F. Kennedy carrier group. STANAVFORMED is part of NATO's 'Reaction Force' and as such was ready to respond to any crisis in NATO's area of interest, although its primary area of operations is the Mediterranean. Spruance was expected to remain assigned to STANAVFORMED through March 2000.[citation needed
]

2000s

Spruance arrives for a port visit in Crete in 2004

On 1 June 2000, Spruance became the first U.S. Navy ship to use the

Composite Unit Training Exercises (COMPTUEX). The exercise, which began the week prior, also utilized the northern and southern Puerto Rican operating areas, and involved complex battle group training events, naval surface fire-support training and air-to-ground bombing. COMPTUEX is an intermediate level battle group exercise designed to forge the battle group into a cohesive, fighting team, and is a critical step in the predeployment training cycle and prerequisite for the battle group's Joint Task Force Exercise (JTFEX) scheduled for early the following year. Successful completion of the COMPTUEX also certifies the carrier and its embarked air wing as qualified for open ocean operations.[citation needed
]

Spruance, along with the John F. Kennedy carrier group took part, from 19 January through 26 January 2002, in Phase I of Joint Task Force Exercise (JTFEX) 02-1; and from 7 – 14 February in Phase II of Joint Task Force Exercise (JTFEX) 02-1. The JTFEX is designed to meet the requirement for quality, realistic training to prepare U.S. forces for joint and combined operations and also provides the opportunity to certify the CVBG for deployment. That particular JTFEX was scheduled for two phases to accommodate recent repairs to the carrier, which required it to be pierside during Phase I. The exercise took place in the waters off the East Coast, as well as on training ranges in North Carolina and Florida.[citation needed]

Deploying with the John F. Kennedy carrier group in June 2004, Spruance returned to Mayport on 7 December 2004. She decommissioned 23 March 2005. She was sunk as a target for aircraft-launched

Harpoon missiles in the Atlantic Ocean off the Virginia Capes on 8 December 2006.[5][6]

Gallery

  • USS Spruance in February 1975
    USS Spruance in February 1975
  • USS Spruance on 1 February 1982
    USS Spruance on 1 February 1982
  • USS Spruance on 29 November 1986
    USS Spruance on 29 November 1986
  • USS Spruance in June 1987
    USS Spruance in June 1987

Awards

See also

References

  1. Naval Historical Center. USS Spruance (DD-963) – Construction and Commissioning, 1970–1975 Archived 14 February 2013 at the Wayback Machine
    .
  2. ^ DX Destroyer. // Department of Defense appropriations for 1970. Pt.3: Procurement, p. 562.
  3. ^ "Navy Destroyer Runs Aground in Bahamas". Associated Press. 26 January 1989. Retrieved 2 October 2021.
  4. ^ "Navy: Junior Officer's Errors Caused Destroyer Grounding". Associated Press. 28 November 1989. Retrieved 2 October 2021.
  5. ^ Jack Dorsey (20 December 2006). "Navy sinks destroyer Spruance in training exercise". The Virginian-Pilot.
  6. ^ NavSource Naval History: USS SPRUANCE (DD-963) Accessed June 25, 2023

External links

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