USS Wood County (LST-1178) seen marrying up with LCU-1612 and another LCU to form a causeway to the beach, date and place unknown |
|
| Career | |
|---|---|
| Name: | USS Wood County |
| Namesake: | Wood County |
| Builder: | American Ship Building Company, Lorain, Ohio |
| Laid down: | 1 October 1956 |
| Launched: | 14 December 1957 |
| Commissioned: | 5 August 1959 |
| Decommissioned: | 1 May 1972 |
| Struck: | 16 February 1989 |
| Honours and awards: |
Meritorious Unit Commendation (Dominican Republic) |
| Fate: | Scrapped, July 2002 |
| General characteristics | |
| Class & type: | De Soto County-class tank landing ship |
| Displacement: | 3,560 long tons (3,617 t) light 7,823 long tons (7,949 t) full load |
| Length: | 446 ft (136 m) |
| Beam: | 62 ft (19 m) |
| Draft: | 17 ft (5.2 m) |
| Propulsion: | 6 × Cooper Bessemer diesel engines, replaced in September, 1969 with six Fairbanks-Morse diesels, two propellers |
| Speed: | 17 knots (31 km/h; 20 mph) |
| Boats & landing craft carried: |
4 LCVPs |
| Capacity: | • 28 medium tanks or vehicles to 75 tons on 288 ft (88 m) tank deck • 100,000 gal (US) diesel or jet fuel, plus 7,000 gal fuel for embarked vehicles |
| Troops: | 410 officers and enlisted men |
| Complement: | 170 officers and enlisted men |
| Armament: | 3 × twin 3"/50 caliber gun mounts |
USS Wood County (LST-1178) was a De Soto County-class tank landing ship built for the United States Navy during the late 1950s. Named after counties in Ohio, Texas, West Virginia, and Wisconsin, she was the only U.S. Naval vessel to bear the name.
Wood County was laid down on 1 October 1956 at Lorain, Ohio by the American Ship Building Company; launched on 14 December 1957; sponsored by Miss Margaret Ackerman, daughter of the president of the American Shipbuilding Company; and commissioned on 5 August 1959 at the Norfolk Naval Shipyard, Portsmouth, Virginia with Commander Maxton M. Midgett in command.
Famous quotes containing the words wood and/or county:
“To begin at the beginning: It is spring, moonless night in the small town, starless and bible-black, the cobblestreets silent and the hunched courters’-and-rabbits’ wood limping invisible down to the sloeblack, slow, black, crowblack, fishingboat-bobbing sea.”
—Dylan Thomas (1914–1953)
“Jack: A politician, huh?
Editor: Oh, county treasurer or something like that.
Jack: What’s so special about him?
Editor: They say he’s an honest man.”
—Robert Rossen (1908–1966)