USS Newport News (CA-148)-- Part 7: Decommissioning and Scrapping

Operations by Vietnam resumed October 21 October and continued until December 1972, when the ship was recalled to homeport at Norfolk.  During 1973 and 1974 the ship undertook training cruises and visited many ports around the world before being recalled for decommissioning.

While there was some interest in retaining her for her "big gun" capability in the fleet, a survey to determine further service indicated the ship was beyond economical refitting.

The Newport News was decommissioned on 27 June 1975 and stricken from the Naval Vessel Register on 31 July  1978.  

She spent her later years as part of the Philadelphia Naval Shipyard Mothball Fleet and was sold for scrap in New Orleans, Louisiana, , on 25 February1993.

The museum ship USS Quincy, in Quincy, Massachusetts, contains her bell and other items.

In the Hampton Roads Naval Museum's The Ten-Thousand Day War at Sea: The US Navy in Vietnam, 1970-1975 section, a large model of the USS Newport News.

--Cooter

USS Newport News (CA-148)-- Part 3: 'The Gray Ghost of the East Coast'

The USS Newport News then spent fifty days patrolling off the coast of North Vietnam as part of Operation Sea Dragon, the Navy's effort to destroy waterborne logistics craft, military supply routes and installations in North Vietnam.

During this period of time, she  conducted  156 strikes against 325 North Vietnamese  coastal defense sites.  According to observers, the ship sank 17 waterborne logistics craft, damaged another 14 and destroyed several enemy bunkers and radar sites,  bridges, barges, trucks and roads.

(Waterborne logistics craft are ships that deliver supplies to military units and sites, in case you're wondering like me.)

On 19 December 1967, the ship exchanged fire with 20-28 separate shore batteries, simultaneously, off the coast of North Vietnam.  During this engagement, over 300 enemy rounds bracketed the Newport News, but she suffered no direct hits.

This encounter caused forward observers to nickname the Newport News "The Gray Ghost from the East Coast."  She kept that moniker throughout three deployments to Vietnam.

--Cooter