SSN Hyman G. Rickover deactivated

From Navy Times

December 14, 2006

Attack sub Rickover to be inactivated today

By William H. McMichael

Staff writer

Crew members of the Los Angeles-class submarine Hyman G. Rickover prepare to tie up Oct. 11 at Naval Station Norfolk, Va., after the boat’s final deployment. Rickover will be inactivated today. — MCSN Kelvin Edwards / Navy

NORFOLK NAVAL STATION, Va. — The 22-year-old attack submarine Hyman G. Rickover will be inactivated Thursday during a ceremony at its home port of Norfolk Naval Station, the Atlantic Fleet Submarine Force announced.

The ship’s sponsor and widow of the late Adm. Rickover, retired Cmdr. Eleonore Rickover, will attend the 1 p.m. ceremony at Norfolk’s pier 3.

Adm. Rickover — who led the effort to develop the world’s first nuclear submarine, Nautilus, and became known as the “father of the nuclear Navy” — retired in 1982 after 63 years of continuous active service. He died in 1986.

The sub completed its last six-month deployment in October “conducting operations in support of national security taskings and the Global War on Terrorism,” according to a press release from the Atlantic Fleet Submarine Force.

The 22nd sub in the Los Angeles class, Rickover is being retired because of a combination of factors, according to Atlantic Fleet Submarine Force spokesman Lt. Cmdr. Chris Loundermon. These include the sub’s age; the cost of maintenance, modifications, and of refueling the nuclear sub; demands on the 2007 Navy budget; and the need to trim the submarine force to 48. That trim was mandated by the 2006 Quadrennial Defense Review and endorsed by Chief of Naval Operations Adm. Mike Mullen, Loundermon said.

Ten of the 21 subs that preceded Rickover remain in commission: Los Angeles, Bremerton, La Jolla and City of Corpus Christi in Pacific Fleet, and Philadelphia, Memphis, Jacksonville, Dallas, Albuquerque and Minneapolis-St. Paul in the Atlantic Fleet Submarine Force.

After Rickover is inactivated, the Navy will have 52 fast-attack submarines, Loundermon said.

The 360-foot sub will be transported to Portsmouth Naval Shipyard in Kittery, Maine, in early 2007 for the yearlong inactivation process, according to SubLant.