THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: WEDNESDAY, June 29, 1994 TAG: 9406290387
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B3 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: ASSOCIATED PRESS
DATELINE: 940629 LENGTH: NORFOLK
The Saginaw, taken out of service at the Little Creek Naval Amphibious Base, is expected to be renamed the Kanimbla later this year for a new job with the Australian navy. U.S. Navy officials said the date for the transfer has not been determined.
{REST} The Saginaw, named for the county seat in Saginaw County, Mich., was commissioned in January 1971 and served in a wide range of assignments, from an Apollo moon landing splashdown to Operation Desert Storm in the Middle East.
Another tank-landing ship, the Barnstable County, will be taken out of service Wednesday. The Barnstable County became the first U.S. warship to cross the Suez Canal after the canal reopened in 1974.
It had closed in 1967 during fighting between Israel and Egypt.
The losses of the Saginaw and Barnstable County will be offset by the arrival of the Normandy.
The Normandy, an AEGIS cruiser commissioned in December 1989, became the fifth ship to be relocated to Norfolk Naval Base as a result of the 1993 round of military base closings. The Normandy had been assigned to New York Naval Station.
The Normandy will spend its first week in Virginia at the new Nauticus national maritime center in downtown Norfolk on public display. With a crew of 37 officers and 378 enlisted personnel, the Normandy participated in 50th anniversary D-Day ceremonies earlier this month in Great Britain and France.
The ship, named for the coastal location of the Allied invasion in June 1944, carried five World War II veterans of the Normandy landing and received more than 15,000 visitors for memorial services.
The Normandy also served in the Persian Gulf war, firing 26 Tomahawk missiles on Iraqi positions, and in 1993 operated in the Adriatic Sea to support United Nations peacekeeping efforts in Bosnia.
by CNB