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USS Nitro (AE 23)

USS NITRO was the third SURIBACHI - class ammunition ship and the second United States Navy vessel to bear the name. Decommissioned after almost exactly 36 years of service on April 28, 1995, the ship was then stricken from the Navy list on August 14, 1995, and spent the following years laid up at the James River Reserve Fleet in Fort Eustis, VA, awaiting final disposal. In July 2008, the NITRO was sold to Esco Marine, Brownsville, Tx., for scrapping.

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Crew List:

This section contains the names of sailors who served aboard USS NITRO. It is no official listing but contains the names of sailors who submitted their information.

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• Click here to see which USS NITRO memorabilia are currently for sale on ebay.

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USS NITRO Cruise Books:

• Mediterranean Cruise 1976

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Accidents aboard USS NITRO:

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USS NITRO History:

USS NITRO was laid down by the Bethlehem Steel Corporation at its Sparrows Point Shipyard near Baltimore, Maryland, on May 20, 1957, launched on June 25, 1958, sponsored by Mrs. Randolph McCall Pate, and commissioned on May 1, 1959, with Captain Warren C. Hall in command. Following commissioning, NITRO conducted shakedown training in the Caribbean before reporting to her first home port at Davisville, Rhode Island. After a period of Second Fleet exercises, she made her first deployment to the Mediterranean in February 1960 and joined the United States Sixth Fleet. This established the operating pattern that characterized much of the first half of her career: ammunition loading and training on the United States East Coast followed by extended Mediterranean deployments supporting Sixth Fleet forces. During the 1960 deployment, she was photographed in the Mediterranean with USS TORSK (SS 423) alongside. NITRO remained with the Sixth Fleet until returning to the United States in September 1960.

NITRO returned to the Mediterranean during the summer of 1961. The deployment took place against the background of continuing Cold War tension in Europe and the Mediterranean, where the Sixth Fleet maintained a permanent naval presence and regularly operated with allied forces. NITRO remained overseas into early 1962 and returned to Norfolk, Virginia, on March 3, 1962. During April and May, she supported Second Fleet exercises in the Caribbean. On September 6, she departed for an operational and goodwill cruise to northern European waters. NITRO returned to Naval Ammunition Depot Earle, New Jersey, on October 15.

Only a few weeks later, NITRO became involved in one of the most serious Cold War confrontations of the period. Following the discovery of Soviet nuclear missiles in Cuba, President John F. Kennedy announced a naval quarantine of the island on October 22, 1962. NITRO operated in the Caribbean from November 11 through November 24 in support of the concentration of American naval forces around Cuba. Her qualifying service for the Armed Forces Expeditionary Medal associated with the Cuban operation extended from November 13 through November 23. Although the immediate confrontation had begun to ease following the Soviet decision to remove the missiles, United States naval forces remained deployed while implementation of the agreement was monitored. NITRO returned to Davisville on November 24.

On February 6, 1963, NITRO departed again for operations with the Sixth Fleet. She spent more than seven months away from Davisville before returning on September 24. She subsequently entered a shipyard in Brooklyn, New York, for overhaul. After completion of the work she resumed operations along the East Coast and in the Caribbean, combining ammunition-support exercises with the close-formation underway-replenishment training required to transfer heavy ordnance between ships at sea.

NITRO departed for another Mediterranean deployment on July 17, 1964. During the cruise, she supplied units of the Sixth Fleet while they maintained the continuing United States naval presence in the region. A particularly well-documented replenishment occurred in the Tyrrhenian Sea on January 8, 1965. NITRO steamed alongside USS FORRESTAL (CVA 59) and transferred ammunition while USS ALTAIR (AKS 32) simultaneously supplied general stores from the carrier's opposite side. The evolution demonstrated the coordinated replenishment procedures that allowed a carrier to receive different categories of supplies without leaving the operating area. NITRO returned from the Mediterranean on February 5, 1965.

For most of the remainder of 1965, NITRO operated from Davisville and in the Caribbean. On November 16, she again departed eastward for Gibraltar and another tour with the Sixth Fleet. She returned from the Mediterranean on March 22, 1966. By then, the Navy was modernizing its ammunition ships to meet the changing requirements of a fleet increasingly dependent upon guided missiles and helicopter-supported logistics.

On May 18, 1966, NITRO's status was changed to "in commission, in reserve", and she entered Maryland Shipbuilding and Drydock Company at Baltimore for a major conversion. The work modernized her ammunition-handling equipment and altered the after part of the ship to support helicopter operations, allowing ammunition to be moved not only through conventional connected replenishment but also by vertical replenishment. This gave NITRO greater flexibility when sea conditions, tactical circumstances or the configuration of a receiving ship made an alongside transfer difficult or undesirable. The conversion occupied more than a year. NITRO was recommissioned in a special status on August 31, 1967, and finally got underway again on October 16. She spent the following period rebuilding operational proficiency along the East Coast.

By 1968, NITRO had resumed normal fleet service. On June 25, 1968, while operating near Jacksonville, Florida, she conducted an ammunition replenishment with USS FORRESTAL. During the remainder of the decade, she again followed the established Atlantic Fleet pattern of Second Fleet operations, training and periodic Sixth Fleet deployments. The geopolitical environment remained dominated by the Cold War, while the ammunition requirements of the United States Navy were also being shaped by the continuing Vietnam War even though NITRO remained an Atlantic Fleet ship during most of this period.

A cruise book documents NITRO's 1970-1971 operations. In March 1971, she was photographed underway in the Mediterranean with USS WILLIAM R. RUSH (DD 714), providing additional evidence of her continuing Sixth Fleet service. During the summer of 1971, NITRO entered a major overhaul at Boston, Massachusetts. The industrial period continued into the beginning of 1972. She began the year at the Bethlehem shipyard in Boston and completed the overhaul during January. After a short period at Davisville, NITRO got underway on January 31 for Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, where ship and crew underwent refresher training intended to restore full operational readiness following the lengthy yard period. Subsequent operations took her to ammunition facilities at Davisville, Earle and Yorktown as preparations were made for an assignment very different from her previous Mediterranean deployments.

The North Vietnamese Easter Offensive began on March 30, 1972, producing a rapid expansion of American naval and air operations in Southeast Asia. Additional aircraft carriers and surface combatants were ordered into the region, increasing the requirement for ammunition ships capable of sustaining intensive operations at sea. NITRO was consequently assigned to the western Pacific. She departed Davisville on April 19, 1972, and proceeded to Naval Weapons Station Earle to complete her ammunition load.

NITRO departed Earle on April 24. Her departure became the scene of an antiwar protest in which demonstrators in small craft attempted to interfere with the ship's movement. Seven members of NITRO's crew jumped overboard as the ship departed and were subsequently recovered. The incident occurred against the background of widespread domestic opposition to the Vietnam War during the final years of direct American combat involvement. On April 29, NITRO passed through the Panama Canal for the first time, transferring from the Atlantic to the Pacific, and then continued westward toward Southeast Asia.

By late May 1972, NITRO had entered the operating cycle supporting United States Seventh Fleet combat forces off Vietnam. Her first officially credited Vietnam service period ran from May 30 through June 13. Her basic operating pattern consisted of loading ammunition at logistical bases, proceeding to the operating areas off Vietnam, and replenishing aircraft carriers, cruisers, destroyers and other ships before withdrawing to reload. These operations occurred while the United States was conducting Operation Linebacker against North Vietnam and maintaining a large concentration of naval aviation in the Gulf of Tonkin.

NITRO returned to qualifying Vietnam operations from June 26 through June 30, 1972. On June 28, while conducting an underway replenishment approximately 150 nautical miles east of Da Nang, she collided with USS ORISKANY (CVA 34). The ships were operating alongside when the carrier made contact with NITRO. Damage to NITRO was limited and no serious personnel casualties resulted, while aboard ORISKANY the collision put the No. 3 aircraft elevator out of operation. The carrier nevertheless remained capable of continuing operations and subsequently received repairs to the damaged equipment at Yokosuka.

NITRO began another Vietnam service period on July 15 and remained in qualifying operations through July 27. She returned from August 2 through August 15 and again from August 30 through September 9. These periods coincided with continuing intensive carrier air operations against North Vietnamese targets and naval efforts to restrict the movement of supplies into North Vietnam. NITRO's role remained logistical: she transported and transferred bombs, missiles, projectiles and other ammunition required by the ships conducting those operations.

After additional loading and turnaround periods, NITRO again operated in the theater from October 1 through October 10 and from October 19 through October 29, 1972. Another operational period followed from November 14 through December 3. She returned to the combat-support cycle from December 17 through December 28. This period overlapped Operation Linebacker II, the intensive United States air campaign against North Vietnam that began on December 18. Aircraft carriers operating in the Gulf of Tonkin continued flying combat missions during the campaign, producing a continuing requirement for ammunition replenishment.

NITRO's Vietnam service continued into 1973. She received qualifying service credit from January 2 through January 4, January 13 through January 19, and January 26 through January 29. The Paris Peace Accords were signed on January 27, providing for a cease-fire and the withdrawal of the remaining United States combat forces from Vietnam. NITRO's final credited period therefore extended across the date on which the agreement was signed. After completing her western Pacific assignment, she began the long return voyage to the United States. The return included passage back across the Pacific and through the Panama Canal. NITRO arrived at Davisville on March 12, 1973, ending an unusually long deployment that had taken an Atlantic Fleet ammunition ship through the Panama Canal to sustained Seventh Fleet service off Vietnam.

Following her return from Southeast Asia, NITRO resumed Atlantic Fleet duties. The reduction of direct United States combat involvement in Vietnam shifted her operational emphasis back toward Second Fleet training and Sixth Fleet deployments. She continued to carry ammunition between shore installations and operating forces and to conduct both connected and helicopter-assisted replenishment. In 1974, NITRO's home port was shifted from Davisville to Naval Weapons Station Earle, New Jersey, integrating the ship more closely with one of the Atlantic Fleet's principal ammunition-storage and loading facilities. USS SURIBACHI (AE 21) was subsequently also homeported at Earle, and the installation developed into an important operational base for the Atlantic Fleet's ammunition ships.

A cruise book documents another NITRO Mediterranean deployment in 1976. During that cruise, she was photographed at Naples, Italy, in June. By the middle of the decade, she continued a regular cycle of Sixth Fleet operations, ammunition loading at Earle and periods of maintenance and training in the western Atlantic.

NITRO underwent another substantial overhaul during the latter part of the 1970s. A Navy photograph taken in January 1978 documents her after completion of the overhaul, and on January 30, she was photographed underway off the Virginia Capes. She then returned to fleet operations. Early in 1979, she was photographed conducting an underway replenishment in the Atlantic with USS CANISTEO (AO 99) while steaming westward. NITRO subsequently undertook another Mediterranean cruise during 1979-1980. On November 9, 1979, she was photographed at anchor at Genoa, Italy.

In September 1980, NITRO participated in the major North Atlantic Treaty Organization exercise Teamwork 80. The exercise ran from September 10 through September 24 and involved a large multinational force operating in the North Atlantic, North Sea, Norwegian Sea and English Channel. Its purpose was to test the alliance's ability to reinforce and resupply northern Europe and protect transatlantic and amphibious forces during a major conflict. American participants included USS NIMITZ (CVN 68), USS MOUNT WHITNEY (LCC 20), USS WAINWRIGHT (CG 28), USS SAIPAN (LHA 2), USS IWO JIMA (LPH 2), numerous surface combatants and amphibious ships, and NITRO in the fleet-support role.

The beginning of 1981 found NITRO at Naval Weapons Station Earle preparing for another six-month Mediterranean deployment. She departed on February 3 as a member of Transit Group Two together with USS WAINWRIGHT, USS McCLOY (FF 1038), USS TRUETT (FF 1095), USS JONAS INGRAM (DD 938), and USNS WACCAMAW (T-AO 109). The group operated under Rear Admiral Henry C. Mustin, Commander Cruiser Destroyer Group Two. After crossing the Atlantic, NITRO reached Rota, Spain, on February 14 and relieved USS SURIBACHI as the Sixth Fleet ammunition ship.

Only five days later, on February 19, NITRO replenished USS JOHN F. KENNEDY (CV 67) and several other ships of the carrier's task group. She then proceeded to Menton, France, for the first liberty visit of the deployment. Members of the crew were able to visit festivities at Nice as well as Menton's annual lemon festival. A short visit to Palma de Mallorca, Spain, followed, after which NITRO replenished USS FORRESTAL and ships of its battle group. Further Mediterranean port visits included Naples, Italy; Barcelona, Spain; Palma de Mallorca again; and Cartagena, Spain. During an upkeep period at Cartagena, members of the crew participated in a community-relations project involving refurbishment work at a local home for elderly residents. After leaving Cartagena, NITRO again replenished FORRESTAL and other battle-group ships during a March logistics evolution. Additional calls included Trieste, Italy; Toulon, France; and Augusta Bay, Sicily. At Augusta Bay the ship prepared for the May logistical support cycle for Sixth Fleet forces.

The deployment proceeded normally until June 1, 1981, when a major fire erupted in NITRO's main engineering space while she was operating near Crete. Six members of the crew were injured. The casualty disabled the ship and deprived her of the propulsion capability required to continue independently. USNS NEOSHO (T-AO 143) took NITRO under tow to Souda Bay, Crete, while USS NASSAU (LHA 4) provided support during the immediate response. After the situation had been stabilized, USS EDENTON (ATS 1) towed NITRO from Souda Bay to the Hellenic Shipyard at Skaramangas, Greece. Personnel from Naval Surface Group Mediterranean and Charleston Naval Shipyard supervised the work. Repairs required approximately 30 days. NITRO departed Greece on July 13 and began the return transit to the United States, arriving at Naval Weapons Station Earle on the morning of July 30.

After leave and upkeep, NITRO's ammunition was offloaded in preparation for a much more extensive overhaul. The Board of Inspection and Survey conducted a material inspection on September 21. On November 16, 1981, NITRO entered Coastal Drydock and Repair Corporation in Brooklyn, New York, for a regular overhaul and was dry-docked on December 2. The overhaul was extensive because normal modernization work was combined with repairs and improvements resulting from the June fire. The contract was valued at approximately $18.8 million.

NITRO spent the majority of 1982 at Coastal Drydock. She was undocked on May 18 after approximately five and a half months in dry dock. Although the regular overhaul had originally been planned to last a full year, it was completed in a little more than ten months. The work affected almost every department. Communications, surface-search radar and radio equipment were upgraded. The main engineering space was essentially rebuilt because of the damage sustained in the 1981 fire, and additional fire-protection systems, including bilge-flooding and Halon 1301 equipment, were installed. Deckhouses were added over elevator platforms serving ammunition holds Nos. 2 and 3, new encapsulated life rafts were fitted, and fourth-generation electrohydraulic equipment was installed at the replenishment stations. Habitability improvements included remodeled dining facilities and new modular berthing and storage arrangements.

During the third week of August 1982, NITRO's engineers successfully completed a Light Off Examination as the ship progressed toward renewed operational certification. On September 3, Commander Archibald E. Millis Jr. relieved Captain Howard H. Loving during a change-of-command ceremony on NITRO's flight deck at Coastal Drydock in Brooklyn. September and October were devoted to the transition from shipyard status back to fleet operations, including dock trials, fast cruises and Mobile Logistics Support Force training. On September 21, NITRO got underway under her own propulsion for the first time since returning from the Mediterranean on July 30, 1981. The remainder of the year was devoted to restoring full operational readiness.

NITRO began 1983 at Naval Weapons Station Earle, where she underwent a Supply Management Inspection, a Nuclear Weapons Acceptance Inspection and a departure material review. She departed on January 20 for refresher training at Guantanamo Bay. The training tested the ship across the range of its assigned missions, and the engineering department successfully completed an Operational Propulsion Plant Examination. NITRO returned to Earle on March 5 and received formal operational certification on March 8. A command inspection followed from March 7 through March 9, after which a restricted availability was used to complete additional repairs and adjust the ammunition load.

On April 7 and April 8, 1983, NITRO provided ammunition and heavy-lift services to USS JOHN F. KENNEDY, including delivery of aircraft engines. She then joined units under Destroyer Squadron 14 for Composite Task Unit Exercise 2-83. After completion of the exercise she visited Bermuda from April 20 through April 22 before returning to Earle.

A particularly demanding ammunition evolution followed in May. NITRO adjusted her load so that much of her magazine capacity was available to receive ammunition being removed from USS NIMITZ. She was underway for the assignment from May 11 through May 21. The intensive portion of the offload took place from May 15 through May 18. NITRO simultaneously employed connected-replenishment rigs and two CH-46 Sea Knight helicopters to move ammunition from the carrier. During a single 15-hour period alongside NIMITZ on May 16, approximately 1,440 loads were transferred to NITRO. The evolution represented one of the largest concentrated ammunition-handling assignments the ship had undertaken up to that point.

The most operationally demanding portion of NITRO's 1983 service came later in the year as the security situation in Lebanon deteriorated. United States naval forces had concentrated in the eastern Mediterranean in support of the American contingent of the Multinational Force in Beirut. Beginning on October 20, NITRO operated an intensive ammunition and logistics shuttle between Augusta Bay, Sicily, and ships stationed off Lebanon. In addition to ammunition, she carried stores, food and mail to Sixth Fleet units.

Between October 20 and December 19, 1983, NITRO completed four shuttle runs into the eastern Mediterranean and conducted 34 alongside replenishments and 39 vertical replenishments. Among the major ships she serviced were USS DWIGHT D. EISENHOWER (CVN 69), USS JOHN F. KENNEDY, USS INDEPENDENCE (CV 62), and USS NEW JERSEY (BB 62). Augusta Bay served as the principal logistical base during these operations. NITRO's only port visit away from Augusta Bay during the intensive shuttle period was a brief stay at Naples from December 6 through December 8.

On December 16, 1983, NITRO carried out one of the more unusual ammunition replenishments of her career when she supplied 16-inch/50-caliber projectiles and powder charges to USS NEW JERSEY at sea. The transfer occurred less than 40 hours after the battleship had used her main battery during operations off Lebanon. According to NITRO's contemporary command history, it was the first at-sea replenishment of NEW JERSEY's 16-inch ammunition by an Atlantic Fleet Mobile Logistics Support Force unit since the battleship's recommissioning. NITRO's service connected with the Lebanon operation qualified her for the Armed Forces Expeditionary Medal.

On December 19, NITRO moored at the Hellenic Shipyard at Skaramangas for a restricted availability lasting through the end of the year. The yard period closed a demanding operational cycle that had taken the ship from post-overhaul certification at the beginning of 1983 to sustained logistical operations during an active regional crisis. NITRO continued Sixth Fleet service during the mid-1980s. In 1985, she again operated in the Mediterranean during prolonged instability surrounding Lebanon. On July 5, while United States naval forces were operating off Beirut, NITRO participated with USS SYLVANIA (AFS 2) in a vertical replenishment of USS NASHVILLE (LPD 13). The Sixth Fleet maintained substantial forces in the eastern Mediterranean during this period because of the unstable security environment and the possibility of evacuation or other contingency operations.

In 1986, NITRO's operating area shifted temporarily toward northern European waters. During the late summer and autumn, she participated in major allied exercises including Northern Wedding 86 and associated northern European operations. The force centered on USS NIMITZ and included USS IOWA (BB 61), USS MOUNT WHITNEY, USS SOUTH CAROLINA (CGN 37), USS KIDD (DDG 993), USS RICHARD E. BYRD (DDG 23), USS THORN (DD 988), USS DOYLE (FFG 39), USS W. S. SIMS (FF 1059), USS MOINESTER (FF 1097), USS TRUETT, and USS KALAMAZOO (AOR 6), together with NITRO. The exercises tested the ability of allied naval forces to operate in the North Atlantic and Norwegian Sea and reinforce northern Europe in the event of a major confrontation with the Warsaw Pact.

NITRO conducted underway ammunition replenishments during these operations, including documented work with USS IOWA. On October 4, she also replenished USS KIDD during the return from northern European waters.

NITRO subsequently returned to the Mediterranean as part of the forces associated with USS NIMITZ's December 1986 deployment. Her operations continued into 1987. On February 5, 1987, she was photographed underway off the coast of Lebanon while operating with forces associated with the NIMITZ deployment. Her presence there came during another period of tension in Lebanon and demonstrated the continuing requirement for ammunition support in the eastern Mediterranean. Commander David B. Jennings assumed command on July 27, 1987, succeeding Commander William J. Stillmaker, who had commanded NITRO since June 20, 1985.

NITRO remained an active Atlantic Fleet ammunition ship through the closing years of the Cold War. Aerial photography records her at anchor on March 18, 1988. In 1989, she undertook another Mediterranean cruise. On February 14, during that deployment, NITRO conducted an ammunition transfer with USS WHIDBEY ISLAND (LSD 41). The amphibious ship was then engaged in a sequence of training activities that included a non-combatant evacuation exercise.

The political changes in Eastern Europe during 1989 and the rapid decline of the Cold War confrontation did not immediately reduce NITRO's operational commitments. Events in the Middle East instead produced another major ammunition requirement. Iraq invaded Kuwait on August 2, 1990, prompting the deployment of United States and coalition forces under Operation Desert Shield. NITRO subsequently deployed in support of the military buildup and the later combat operations of Operation Desert Storm.

During her movement toward the operational area, USS MISSISSIPPI (CGN 40) provided air-defense escort for NITRO during passage through the Bab el-Mandeb and into the Gulf of Aden on January 18, 1991. The assignment reflected the importance attached to protecting ammunition and logistics ships while they moved toward the Persian Gulf. NITRO subsequently operated in the Persian Gulf and supplied ammunition to ships preparing for combat. Among the vessels she supported was USS WISCONSIN (BB 64), which received ammunition from NITRO only a few days before coalition offensive operations began on January 17, 1991. The replenishment formed part of the logistical preparations for the opening phase of Operation Desert Storm, during which WISCONSIN employed both Tomahawk cruise missiles and her 16-inch guns. NITRO's service in the theater qualified her for the Southwest Asia Service Medal.

Later in 1991, NITRO entered New York Shipyard Corporation in Brooklyn for another major overhaul. The approximately $8.1 million contract called for about three months of work. The overhaul included hull blasting and coating, tank preservation, shafting and propeller work, overhaul of sea valves, and extensive repairs to boilers, engines, compressors and auxiliary machinery. By this stage, NITRO had been in commissioned service for more than 32 years, making continuing maintenance increasingly important to keeping the steam-powered ship operational.

During the early 1990s, NITRO nevertheless continued active fleet service. Her assignments included another Mediterranean deployment and multiple ammunition rollback voyages to Scotland as the Navy redistributed and reduced ammunition stocks following the end of the Cold War and changes in overseas force structure. NITRO remained homeported at Naval Weapons Station Earle and continued providing ammunition support to Atlantic Fleet and Sixth Fleet units.

Commander Craig M. Huber assumed command on November 1, 1993, and became NITRO's final commanding officer. By the middle of the 1990s, the Navy was retiring its remaining conventionally manned ammunition ships as newer multipurpose combat-logistics ships and Military Sealift Command vessels increasingly assumed the ammunition-replenishment mission. NITRO's age and the cost of maintaining a steam-powered ship designed during the 1950s also weighed against continued service.

USS NITRO was decommissioned on April 28, 1995, ending almost 36 years of commissioned service. She was subsequently placed in the Atlantic Reserve Fleet and maintained at the Naval Inactive Ship Maintenance Facility at Portsmouth, Virginia. Her name was formally struck from the Naval Vessel Register on August 14, 1995. The former NITRO remained in Navy custody for several more years. On March 31, 2000, she was transferred to the Maritime Administration and placed in the National Defense Reserve Fleet in the James River, Virginia. She remained there while awaiting final disposal. Unlike some former ammunition ships that were ultimately expended as live-fire targets, NITRO was selected for dismantling.

On June 22, 2008, the former NITRO was sold to Esco Marine of Brownsville, Texas, for $446,726. She departed the James River Reserve Fleet under tow on July 23 and was taken to Brownsville for dismantling.

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USS NITRO Patch Gallery:

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USS NITRO Image Gallery:

The photos below were contributed by Barry Smith. The first photo shows the NITRO at Curacoa.

The photo below was taken by Michael Martin and shows the NITRO at Esco Marine, Brownsville, Tx., ready to be scrapped. The photo was taken on December 26, 2008.

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