Austin, the carrier's executive officer, piloting a Douglas A-4C Skyhawk. She conducted her first catapult launch on 5 April 1965, with Commander Kenneth B. McDonald, the Chief of Naval Operations and commissioned at the Norfolk Naval Shipyard on 23 January 1965, Captain Lawrence Heyworth Jr., in command.Īfter fitting out there until 15 March 1965, America remained in Hampton Roads for operations off the Virginia Capes until getting underway on 25 March. Catherine McDonald, wife of Admiral David L. launched on 1 February 1964, sponsored by Mrs. She was laid down on 1 January 1961 at Newport News, Virginia, by the Newport News Shipbuilding and Dry Dock Corp. Originally ordered as an Enterprise-class nuclear carrier, the ballooning costs of Enterprise during construction caused the cancellation of the nuclear CVAN-66 and her reordering as a conventionally powered Kitty Hawk-class carrier. She was the largest warship ever to be sunk.Īmerica under construction at Newport News in 1961 In 2005, she was scuttled southeast of Cape Hatteras, after four weeks of tests, despite a large protest of former crew-members who wanted to see her instituted as a memorial museum. She also served in the Persian Gulf War's operations Desert Shield and Desert Storm.Īmerica was the first large aircraft carrier since Operation Crossroads in 1946 to be expended in weapons tests. Commissioned in 1965, she spent most of her career in the Atlantic and Mediterranean, but did make three Pacific deployments serving in the Vietnam War. USS America (CVA/CV-66) was one of three Kitty Hawk-class supercarriers built for the United States Navy in the 1960s. Terrier missile (replaced with Sea Sparrow).