USS Saratoga (CV-60)
History of the USS Saratoga Aircraft Carrier
The USS Saratoga (CV-60) was originally planned as CVB-60, then CVA-60. She was ordered for the U.S. Navy on July 23, 1952. Her keel was laid down at New York Naval Shipyard on Dec. 16, 1952. She was launched Oct. 8, 1955 and commissioned April 14, 1956 under the command of Capt. Robert Joseph Stroh.
In her early career, the USS Saratoga took part in a variety of gunnery, structural, steering, flight and engineering tests. She was boarded by President Dwight D. Eisenhower on June 6, 1957 so he could observe operations. The carrier left for her maiden transatlantic voyage on Sept. 3, heading for the Norwegian Sea to take part in the NATO exercise Operation Strikeback.
USS Saratoga sailed to the Mediterranean as part of the 6th Fleet on Feb. 1, 1958. This was the first of eight Mediterranean deployments she made through December 1967.
The USS Saratoga damaged her flight deck after colliding with the German freighter Bernd Leonhardt on May 24, 1960. In January 1961, a ruptured fuel line caused a fire in the No. 2 machinery room, killing seven men. She continued her patrol mission, proceeding to Athens before heading home as scheduled. The carrier was involved in another near collision with a Russian destroyer in 1967. In December of that year, she sustained heavy damage in a severe Atlantic storm.
In January 1968, USS Saratoga headed to Philadelphia for extensive overhaul and modernization, which was completed Jan. 31, 1969. She hosted President Richard Nixon on Armed Forces Day, May 17, for a demonstration of Carrier Air Wing Three’s firepower.
USS Saratoga headed back to the Mediterranean with the 6th Fleet, passing a Soviet surface force and submarine en route to Cuba on July 9, 1968. She was shadowed by Soviet aircraft on July 17; they were intercepted, photographed and escorted. As part of the 6th Fleet’s Task Group 60.2, she was involved in a show of force in response to the Soviets, the hijacking of a Trans World Airlines flight en route to Syria and the Libyan political coup. Her aircraft flew surveillance and reconnaissance flights against Soviet surface forces. In October, the aircraft carrier supported operations during the Lebanon Crisis.
The USS Saratoga was on another Mediterranean deployment when President Nixon, the Joint Chiefs of Staff and the Secretaries of State and Defense boarded her on Sept. 28, 1970. They learned that President Gamal Abdul Nasser of the United Arab Republic had died, and carrier personnel provided intelligence to the Nixon’s party to apprise them of the resulting situation in the Middle East.
After another 6th Fleet deployment, where she participated in the exercise Operation Magic Sword II, she sailed for her first Western Pacific deployment on April 11, 1972. She arrived at Yankee Station on May 18 and would be stationed in the Tonkin Gulf seven times during Vietnam War operations. The aircraft carrier was reclassified as CV-60, a multipurpose aircraft carrier, on June 30. USS Saratoga lost several of her aircraft while she was on station, but they managed to down their fair share of MiGs as well. She sailed for home via Subic Bay and Singapore on Jan. 7, 1973.
Upon her return home, USS Saratoga rejoined the Atlantic Fleet. In early 1975, she participated in NATO Operation Locked Gate-75, an effort to contain the influence of the Portuguese Communist Party after the Carnation Revolution. The aircraft carrier made several more Mediterranean cruises into the 1990s. During one of those cruises, she collided with the Waccamaw (T-AO-109) and sustained only minor damage; no one was injured. In between deployments, she became the first Navy ship to undergo overhaul as part of the Service Life Extension Program from September 1980 until February 1983. This overhaul earned her the new nickname, “Super Sara.”
The Italian luxury liner Achille Lauro was hijacked by terrorists from the Palestinian Liberation Front on Oct. 7, 1985. Three days later, President Ronald Reagan ordered the USS Saratoga into action. The hijackers had boarded an Egypt Air 737 jetliner. Seven of the aircraft carrier’s F-14 Tomcats forced the hijackers to land, and the terrorists were taken into custody by the Italians.
Operating off the coast of Libya on March 23, 1986, aircraft from the USS Saratoga crossed what Muammar al-Gaddafi called the Line of Death. The Libyans fired at the Tomcats but missed, and American aircraft turned back two Libyan MiGs. By the end of the night, U.S. Navy aircraft had destroyed three Libyan patrol boats and a radar site.
During the early 1990s, USS Saratoga became involved in Operation Desert Shield and Operation Desert Storm. Saddam Hussein claimed to have sunk the aircraft carrier after a SCUD missile missed her by over 100 nautical miles. One of her F-18s was the first American aircraft lost over Iraq, piloted by LCDR Scott Speicher, whose remains were finally found in the summer of 2009. One of her A-6E Intruders was also shot down; Navigator-Bombardier LT Jeffrey Zaun was paraded in front of cameras by the Iraqis before he was returned to U.S. forces and to the USS Saratoga.
USS Saratoga took part in NATO Exercise Display Determination in the fall of 1992. Though all attacks during the exercise were meant to be simulated, a breakdown in communications and the absence of standard terminology resulted in the carrier’s Sea Sparrow missile team firing two live missiles at the Turkish destroyer minelayer TCG Muavenet. Five men were killed, including the Muavenet’s commanding officer, and the Turkish ship’s bridge and Combat Information Center were destroyed.
The USS Saratoga was decommissioned on Aug. 20, 1994 and struck from the Naval Vessel Register the same day. The aircraft carrier earned one battle star for her service in the Vietnam War.
The use of asbestos products was common in shipbuilding components for much of the 20th century because of its resistance to heat, fire, water and corrosion. Because of their asbestos exposure onboard ship and in the shipyards, seamen, shipyard workers and longshoremen are at risk for developing asbestos-related diseases like mesothelioma .
Sources include:
John Hedley-Whyte and Debra R Milamed, “Asbestos and Ship-Building: Fatal Consequences,” Ulster
Med. J. 77(3):191-200 (Sep 2008)
U.S. Navy, A Brief History of Aircraft Carriers – USS Saratoga
