The carrier USS Kitty Hawk has arrived at a scrapping yard in Brownsville, Texas after an epic 16,000-mile journey from Washington state. The carrier, too large to fit through the Panama Canal at over 280 feet wide, was towed around South America, via the Strait of Magellan before it docked in Texas.
Kitty Hawk, nicknamed “Battle Cat”, was the last conventionally-powered aircraft carrier to serve in the US Navy. A veteran of the Vietnam and Afghan wars, Kitty Hawk also served as America’s only forward-deployed carrier in Japan.
The carrier was decommissioned in 2009, after returning from forward-basing in Japan, and has remained in storage at Naval Base Kitsap in Bremerton, Washington. Naval Sea Systems Command sold Kitty Hawk and her sister ship, USS John F. Kennedy, to International Shipbreaking Ltd. in October 2021 for just one penny each.
Kitty Hawk was commissioned in April 1961 and was the United States warship with the second-longest active status, after the sailing ship USS Constitution.