USS Kitty Hawk (CVV-63)

The USS Kitty Hawk (CV-63) was commissioned April 29, 1961, he was the oldest aircraft carrier in the U.S. Navy during its withdrawal from service in late January 2009.
He gave his name to the Kitty Hawk class (USS Kitty Hawk (CV-63), USS Constellation (CV-64), USS America (CV-66)) which is the last representative. It is on a range of Kitty Hawk, North Carolina city, was the site in 1903, the first flight of the Flyer, the Wright brothers' airplane.



This is the second ship to bear the name of the place where occurred the first flight of Orville and Wilbur Wright. Upon entry into service, its code was CVA-63 will be changed during the conversion of aircraft carrier attack multi-mission aircraft carrier. Its cost is estimated at $ 400 million in 1961.

His first home port is Naval Base San Diego from 1960. From 1963 to 1978, he participated in eight long deployments 6 for the support of the forces involved in the Vietnam War.

In March 1976, he was upgraded (bill of 100 million U.S. dollars) and surface-to-air missile RIM-2 Terrier are replaced with Sea Sparrow.
So are not repeated atomic disasters like Hiroshima and Nagasaki, nuclear weapons is prohibited on the entire Japanese territory. This is why the man who was at the end of his career the only aircraft carrier in U.S. conventional propulsion was based in Japan as part of the U.S. Seventh Fleet from 11 August 1998.

This will continue until September 25, 2008, upon arrival in the Yokosuka Naval Base, after negotiations, the USS George Washington (CVN-73) nuclear propulsion to replace the Kitty Hawk is retired from active service on January 31, 2009.
His last home port is Puget Sound Naval Shipyard and Intermediate Maintenance Facility in Bremerton (Washington) for its dismantling.