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March 9, 2005
The U.S. Navy is going to sink a decommissioned aircraft carrier, the USS America, during six weeks of tests, to how well the 80,000 ton carrier could survive torpedoes, cruise missiles, and suicide boat attacks. These tests will take place in the Atlantic ocean, and cost $22 million, before the carrier is deliberately sunk in 6,000 feet of water. This is actually cheaper than scrapping the carrier, as environmental rules make scrapping prohibitively expensive. The 1060 foot long America served from 1965-96. The ship carried a crew of 5,400, and was one of the few ships to serve as long as it did without going through a refurbishment program (SLEP , or Service Life Extension Program). As a result, the carrier is pretty decrepit, and does not contain a lot of small safety and protection improvements normally added during a SLEP. Nevertheless, the tests will be important. No one has been able to land a punch on an American carrier for over half a century. So there is no practical knowledge about exactly how sturdy, or not, these big ships are. The tests on the America will administer a reality check to decades of theoretical calculations about the effects of weapons on carriers.
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