USS Enterprise (CVN-65)

• 1. Introduction

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  USS Enterprise, hull number CVN-65, once left her own escort gasping. After a full-speed run in 1962, the destroyer USS Laffey radioed a message that sailors still repeat: "You win the race. Fuel gone, topside salted, crew wet, and engines tired." The ship that won that race was nicknamed the Big E, a name inherited from the Second World War carrier that bore the name before her. At 1123 feet, she is the longest naval vessel ever built. She was also the only ship of her class, even though planners had wanted five more like her. About 4,600 people lived and worked aboard.

  Three questions run through her story. Why did a ship this ambitious end up with no sisters? What did the Navy's first nuclear-powered carrier actually do across more than five decades of service? And what happens to a vessel full of reactors when the time finally comes to take her apart?

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• 2. Eight Reactors

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  Project SCB 160 called for six nuclear-powered carriers, and Enterprise was meant to lead them. Construction costs climbed so sharply that the other five were cancelled. What remained was a design unlike anything else afloat.

  Eight A2W reactors drove the ship, each one taking the place of a conventional boiler in older carriers. No other aircraft carrier has housed more than two reactors. She also carried four rudders, twice what other carrier classes had, and her hull was shaped more like a cruiser's than a carrier's.

  Admiral Rickover shaped one of her most important choices. The plan had been to fit a new engine called the C-14 Internal Combustion Catapult Powerplant, developed by Reaction Motors. Shortly after launch, the ship was switched to proven C-13 steam catapults instead. Rickover judged the new system an unnecessary risk and expense for a ship already costing so much.

  The same budget pressure left her bare of weapons. She was launched and commissioned without her planned RIM-2 Terrier missile launchers. In late 1967 she received a prototype Basic Point Defense Missile System, with two eight-round box launchers for Sea Sparrow missiles. A third launcher arrived during the refit of 1970-1971. Later upgrades added two NATO Sea Sparrow mounts and three Mk 15 Phalanx gun mounts. One Phalanx mount was eventually removed, and two 21-cell RIM-116 Rolling Airframe Missile launchers took its place.

  Her most unusual feature sat on top of her island. A radar system called SCANFAR combined the AN/SPS-32 and the AN/SPS-33, a long-range search set from Hughes and a square array for three-dimensional tracking. Its range reached 400 nautical miles against large targets and 200 against fighter-sized ones. Only Enterprise and the cruiser USS Long Beach ever carried it, and it drained the electrical systems of both ships. Built on vacuum tubes, it needed constant repair. Above it sat a dome of dipole antennae in six rows, the upper two protected inside piping radomes because the elements were so fragile. In January 1979, a refit removed the whole assembly, including the three-story inverted cone on top. The Navy had to wait for the Aegis AN/SPY-1, with its electronically steered beam, before phased-array radar became truly reliable.

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• 3. Shakedown and Cuba

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  On the 4th of February 1958, workers laid the keel in Shipway 11 at Newport News Shipbuilding and Drydock Company. She was launched on the 24th of September 1960, sponsored by the wife of Navy Secretary William B. Franke. On the 25th of November 1961, she was commissioned under Captain Vincent P. de Poix, who had flown with Fighting Squadron 6 aboard the earlier Enterprise.

  Her maiden voyage began on the 12th of January 1962, opening a long series of tests and training exercises. On the 20th of February 1962, she served as a tracking and measuring station for Friendship 7, the capsule in which Lieutenant Colonel John H. Glenn Jr. made the first American orbital flight. She finished the shakedown at Naval Station Norfolk on the 5th of April 1962.

  In October 1962, her first international crisis arrived. The Soviet Union was building nuclear missile sites on Cuba, and on the 22nd of October President John F. Kennedy ordered a naval and air quarantine of offensive military shipments. Enterprise, as part of Task Force 135, was one of five Second Fleet carriers on the line, alongside Independence, Essex, Lake Champlain and Randolph. By the 28th of October the crisis had ended peacefully, after the United States secretly agreed to remove nuclear missiles from Italy and Turkey.

  On the 19th of December 1962, an E-2 Hawkeye was catapulted from her deck in the first shipboard test of a nose-wheel launch bar. Minutes later an A-6A Intruder repeated the feat. The bar was meant to replace the older catapult bridle and shorten the interval between launches.

  In 1963-1964, under Captain Frederick H. Michaelis, she made two Mediterranean deployments. The second included Operation Sea Orbit, the first nuclear-powered task force, which sailed around the world with the cruisers Long Beach and USS Bainbridge. On the 25th of February 1964, near Souda Bay in Greece, a crewman on the Finnish merchant ship SS Verna Paulin fell and was injured. Enterprise answered the call, and a helicopter delivered a surgeon.

  In October 1964, she returned to Newport News for her first refueling. Her eight reactors had carried her more than 200000 nautical miles. Two propeller shafts were replaced and the electronics updated before she emerged on the 22nd of June 1965. In November of that year she was reassigned to the Seventh Fleet, home-ported at Alameda, California, and headed for a very different kind of test.

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• 4. Vietnam

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  On the 2nd of December 1965, Enterprise became the first nuclear-powered ship to take part in combat, launching aircraft against the Viet Cong near Biên Hòa City. On that first day she flew 125 sorties, dropping 167 short tons of bombs and rockets on enemy supply lines. The next day, the 3rd of December, she set a record of 165 strike sorties in one day.

  By January 1966 she was operating in the Gulf of Tonkin as flagship of Rear Admiral Henry L. Miller, with Captain James L. Holloway III in command. About 350 officers and 4,800 men were aboard. Carrier Air Wing Nine flew F-4B Phantom IIs, A-4C Skyhawks and RA-5C Vigilantes from her deck. When Miller handed over command on the 16th of February 1966, he presented air medals to more than 100 pilots and flight officers.

  On the 20th of June 1967, she left the Gulf of Tonkin after 132 combat days. Her pilots had flown more than 13,400 battle missions, and she had steamed 67,630 miles. Vice Admiral Hyland declared that "the entire Air Wing Nine has earned a resounding 'Well Done'." Her next deployment ended on the 18th of July 1968, with 12,839 catapult launches. Of 12,246 sorties, 9,182 were combat missions.

  In January 1971, she completed sea trials with new reactor cores holding enough energy for ten years. That December, Operation Linebacker II began over North Vietnam. Her aircraft and other carriers reseeded the mine fields in Haiphong harbor and struck missile sites, barracks, petroleum storage and rail yards. The Navy flew 705 sorties around Hanoi and Haiphong in the campaign. Between the 18th and the 22nd of December, it conducted 119 strikes, with weather as the main limit. After the cease-fire in January 1973, Enterprise and Ranger flew 81 combat sorties against supply lines in Laos from the 28th of January, at that government's request.

  A refit at Puget Sound Naval Shipyard prepared her for the Grumman F-14 Tomcat. The No. 4 propulsion shaft was replaced because it had been bent when its screw fouled in a discarded arresting gear cable. On the 18th of March 1974, the first operational Tomcats from VF-1 Wolfpack and VF-2 Bounty Hunters took off and landed. That September she became the first carrier to deploy with the new fighter.

  On the 29th of April 1975, Operation Frequent Wind evacuated Americans and at-risk Vietnamese from Saigon. Enterprise aircraft flew 95 sorties, providing fighter cover for the helicopters. The last helicopter lifted off the embassy roof at 7:53 am on the 30th of April, carrying the last 11 Marine security guards. For the Tomcat, it was also the first combat deployment.

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• 5. Fire and Crises

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  In January 1968, Enterprise was visiting Sasebo, Japan, when North Korea seized the intelligence ship USS Pueblo. She became flagship of Task Force 71 under Rear Admiral Epes and operated near South Korean waters for almost a month in Operation Formation Star. Once negotiations calmed matters, she was released to head for Yankee Station on the 16th of February 1968.

  On the morning of the 14th of January 1969, an aircraft start unit overheated a Zuni rocket on a parked F-4 Phantom. The rocket exploded, setting off fires and more blasts across the flight deck while the destroyers Benjamin Stoddert and Rogers escorted her. Crews contained the fires faster than in earlier flight deck disasters, but 27 sailors died and 314 were injured. Fifteen aircraft were destroyed. Repairs at Pearl Harbor Naval Shipyard, focused on the armored flight deck, finished on the 1st of March 1969.

  On the 14th of April 1969, a North Korean aircraft shot down a Lockheed EC-121 Warning Star over the Sea of Japan, killing all 31 men aboard. The United States activated Task Force 71 to protect future flights, with Enterprise, Ticonderoga, Ranger and Hornet in the plan. The deployment became one of the largest shows of force in the region since the Korean War.

  In December 1971, under Captain Ernest E. Tissot Jr., Enterprise entered the Bay of Bengal during the Indo-Pakistani War. Her task was to show strength against the blockade by the Indian carrier INS Vikrant. A Soviet submarine trailed the American force. A confrontation was avoided when Enterprise moved away toward Southeast Asia.

  In February 1975, Typhoon Gervaise struck Mauritius, and the carrier was sent to help. At Port Louis her personnel spent more than 10,000 man-hours restoring water, power and telephones, clearing roads, and delivering medical help and drinking water by helicopter.

  In February 1977, Ugandan president Idi Amin made hostile remarks about the United States, and Americans in Uganda were held hostage. Enterprise had just left Mombasa after a port call. She stayed off the East African coast for about a week while her Marine detachment and air wing prepared a rescue. Amin released the hostages, and she raced across the Indian Ocean to keep a scheduled stop at NAS Cubi Point in the Philippines.

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• 6. Wars After Vietnam

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  On the 28th of April 1986, Enterprise became the first nuclear-powered carrier to transit the Suez Canal. She moved from the Red Sea into the Mediterranean to take part in Operation El Dorado Canyon, the American bombing of Libya. It was her first Mediterranean visit in more than 22 years.

  In 1988, she escorted reflagged Kuwaiti oil tankers in the Persian Gulf under Operation Earnest Will. On the 14th of April, USS Samuel B. Roberts struck an Iranian mine. In Operation Praying Mantis the United States hit two Iranian oil platforms used as bases against merchant ships. Aircraft from her Carrier Air Wing Eleven bombed two Iranian frigates, helping to sink one and damaging the other. In early December 1989, she and Midway took part in Operation Classic Resolve, answering a request from Philippine president Corazon Aquino during a rebel coup attempt.

  In November 1998, her 16th overseas deployment began with trouble. During the Persian Gulf tour that followed, a port call at Jebel Ali brought former president George H. W. Bush aboard, along with a live concert by Hootie & the Blowfish. In December, her battle group led Operation Desert Fox. Over 70 hours it destroyed Iraqi military targets with more than 300 Tomahawk missiles and 691000 pounds of ordnance. Later, after the Račak massacre and the collapse of the Rambouillet talks, she left a port visit in Cannes to return to the Adriatic. Over 151 days underway she steamed more than 50000 nautical miles. Her battle group was the first to deploy with IT-21, giving sailors internet, email and television.

  On the 11th of September 2001, she was heading home from the Persian Gulf. Without orders, she turned back toward Southwest Asia and outran her own escorts. In the following weeks her aircraft flew nearly 700 missions over Afghanistan and dropped over 800000 pounds of ordnance. She reached Norfolk on the 10th of November, 16 days late. Her final day at sea hosted a live broadcast of Good Morning America. Garth Brooks and Jewel performed from her on the 21st of November, and on the 7th of December President George W. Bush addressed her sailors from the flight deck.

  From September 2003 to February 2004, Enterprise supported Operation Iraqi Freedom, relieving the four carriers that had been on station during the invasion. A USO tour at sea brought wrestler Kurt Angle, racer Mike Wallace and comedian Robin Williams. Actor Ben Affleck visited during a stop in Bahrain. Admiral James Stavridis commanded the battle group, with Captain Eric Neidlinger leading the ship. Among her escorts was the repaired USS Cole.

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• 7. Groundings and Gaffes

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  In April 1983, returning to San Francisco Bay, Enterprise ran aground on a sandbar and stayed stuck for several hours. Aboard as a Navy guest was George Takei, who played helmsman Mr. Sulu on the fictional starship Enterprise. Groundings usually end captains' careers, but Captain Robert J. Kelly had already been picked for promotion to commodore. He eventually became a four-star admiral.

  Late on the 2nd of November 1985, during flight exercises with Captain Robert L. Leuschner Jr. on the bridge, she hit Bishop Rock on the Cortes Bank. The strike opened a gash more than 100 feet long in the outer hull and knocked out one screw. A famous photograph showed a Navy diver reclining inside the notch left in the damaged screw. Repairs cost $17 million. On the 27th of January 1986, Leuschner was relieved by Captain Robert J. Spane.

  On the night of the 8th of November 1998, an EA-6B Prowler landing during carrier qualifications struck the folded wings of an S-3 Viking still on the landing area. The Prowler's four-man crew died when the aircraft hit the water. Three were lost at sea and the fourth was recovered soon after. The Viking's two crew members ejected and were rushed to a hospital in Portsmouth, Virginia. Searchers looked for nearly 24 hours before suspending the effort.

  In March 2001, during the exercise JTFEX 01-2 in the Caribbean, the German submarine U24 "sank" her. The Type 206 boat fired flares and photographed the carrier through its periscope.

  In 2005, leaving the dock after a shipyard overhaul at Newport News, she ran through a sandbar. All eight reactors shut down, and she drifted on emergency power for nearly three hours before tugs brought her back to Norfolk. Her nuclear machinists needed about three days to clear river mud from the condensers.

  A bigger problem was money. An 18-month overhaul that began in April 2008 kept slipping as costs grew. When she left the yard on the 19th of April 2010 for sea trials, refurbishment had cost $662 million. That was 46% over budget, and the work ran eight months late.

  On the 1st of January 2011, the Virginian-Pilot leaked a set of videos called XO Movie Night, shown on the ship's closed-circuit television during 2006-07. Captain Owen Honors, then executive officer, had produced them with profanity, anti-gay slurs and suggestive scenes. Though many Navy personnel backed him, Admiral John C. Harvey Jr. removed him on the 4th of January. Forty sailors, including six flag officers, were later disciplined. Captain Dee Mewbourne took command.

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• 8. The Long Goodbye

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  On the 13th of January 2011, nine days after the command change, Enterprise left for the Persian Gulf and Mediterranean with Carrier Air Wing One. In February, an incident with Somali pirates ended with four American citizens and two pirates dead. By the time she returned to Norfolk on the 15th of July, operations had captured 75 pirates, and her strike group had hit Libyan government targets with missiles.

  Her last deployment began on the 11th of March 2012. In October she crossed the Suez Canal for the final time. From the 16th to the 21st of October she visited Naples, which had been the Big E's first foreign port of call fifty years earlier. On the 4th of November 2012, she reached Norfolk for the last time, after 238 days and nearly 81,000 miles. Her aircraft had flown more than 2,000 sorties over Afghanistan.

  She was deactivated on the 1st of December 2012, adding about $857.3 million in maintenance costs to the Navy's budget for fiscal 2013. She was also the first nuclear-powered carrier to be decommissioned. Enthusiasts wanted a museum, but by 2012 that was judged too expensive, especially since the eight reactors would need removal anyway. At the ceremony, Secretary of the Navy Ray Mabus announced that the Gerald R. Ford-class carrier USS Enterprise (CVN-80) would carry the name. Among the guests was Eugene McDaniel, a former A-6 pilot who had been shot down and captured in North Vietnam. It was his first time back aboard since that day.

  Parts of the old ship were passed forward. One of her anchors went to Abraham Lincoln in 2014. By early 2017, more than 35,000 pounds of her steel had been set aside for CVN-80, and her last crew built a time capsule from her steel and wood. The final reactor was defueled in December 2016, and she was decommissioned on the 3rd of February 2017.

  Because of radiation contamination in her compartments, she could not be sunk as a target. The Navy chose a commercial breakup, with scrapping meant to start in 2025 and finish by 2030, the year CVN-80 is due to launch. Costs were estimated above $1 billion. In June 2025, a $536 million contract went to NorthStar Maritime Dismantlement Services for the job at Mobile, Alabama. A rival protested after a website malfunction delayed its proposal by a few hours. In February 2026, the Court of Federal Claims upheld the protest and ordered the award process reopened.

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