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| Career |
|---|
| Awarded: | 17 May 1965 |
| Laid down: | 31 October 1966 |
| Launched: | 20 May 1970 |
| Commissioned: | 10 July 1971 |
| Fate: | Active, in commission |
| Homeport: | Norfolk, Virginia |
| General Characteristics |
|---|
| Displacement: | 8883 tons light, 16591 tons full, 7708 tons dead |
| Length: | 173.7 meters (570 feet) overall, 167 meters (548 feet) waterline |
| Beam: | 30.4 meters (100 feet) extreme, 25.6 meters (84 feet) waterline |
| Draft: | 6.7 meters (22 feet) maximum, 7 meters (23 feet) limit |
| Speed: | 20 knots |
| Complement: | 29 officers, 487 men |
| Armament: | eight three-inch/50 caliber guns |
USS Ponce (LPD-15), a
Trenton-class amphibious transport dock, was the only ship of the
United States Navy to be named for
the city in the Commonwealth of
Puerto Rico, which in turn was named after the Spanish explorer
Juan Ponce de Leon, the discoverer of
Florida and first governor of Puerto Rico. Her keel was laid down on
31 October 1966 by the Lockheed Shipbuilding and Construction Company of
Seattle, Washington. She was
launched on
20 May 1970 sponsored by Mrs. John J. Hyland, and
commissioned on
10 July 1971.
- Need information from 1971 to 1982
On
2 February 1982 during a towing exercise while en route to
Portsmouth, England,
Ponce collided with USS
Fort Snelling (LSD-30), causing minor damage to
Ponce's port side, mainly to the accommodation ladder and flight deck catwalk.
- Need information from 1982 to 1984
On
14 February 1984, while attempting to move an assault craft to Radio Island, near
Morehead City, North Carolina,
Ponce suffered a major casualty when her stern gate was damaged and eventually lost. She was later repaired in
Philadelphia Naval Shipyard.
- Need information from 1984 to 1990
On
5 August 1990 as part of
Operation Sharp Edge to remove US citizens caught in civil war in
Liberia,
Ponce, together with USS
Saipan (LHA-2), USS
Sumter (LST-1188), and USS
Peterson (DD-969), inserted a
United States Marine Corps reinforced rifle company into the U.S. Embassy compound in
Monrovia for increased security.
- Need information from 1990 to 2001
On
29 August 2001 Ponce crewmembers boarded two derelict Italian boats, a 19-foot motorboat and a 12-foot sailboat, in the
Straits of Messina between
Sicily and
Calabria. The civilian vessels were adrift, creating a navigational hazard. A boarding party in a rigid hull inflatable boat found both derelicts unmanned, though the motorboat was well stocked. They towed both boats back to
Ponce, which flooded her welldeck, brought the boats aboard, carried them into
Catania, and turned them over to the
Guardia Costiera Italiana (Italian Coast Guard).
- Need information from 2001 to 2003
On
10 January 2003 Ponce received orders to depart
Norfolk, Virginia, and take on Marines from Camp Lejeune, North Carolina for the
2003 invasion of Iraq. That duty kept
Ponce at sea through February. At the end of February, she became the flagship of the Commander of Mine Countermeasure Squadron Three, designated as Commander, Task Group 55.4. The Task Group included a
US Navy special clearance team, two explosive ordnance disposal (EOD) units, a
United Kingdom unit and an
Australian team. The ships involved included the mine coastal hunters USS
Cardinal (MHC-60) and USS
Raven (MHC-61), mine counter measure ships USS
Ardent (MCM-12) and USS
Dextrous (MCM-13), and dock landing ship USS
Gunston Hall (LSD-44).
After breaking the Squadron's pennant at her yardarm, Ponce's crew (and Gunston Hall's) enjoyed liberty ashore in Manama, Bahrain, beginning on 28 February. On 5 March, however, the amphibious ships got underway again. Humanitarian aid to the recently-liberated Iraqis was being blocked by naval mines in the Khawar Abd Allah river and the port of Umm Qasr. The weeks-long minesweeping operation was directed from Ponce, the flagship of the Task Group.
The Group used a variety of methods, including MH-53E Sea Dragon helicopters towing magnetic minesweeping sleds, trained marine mammals, unmanned underwater vehicles and EOD divers. On 28 March a 200-yard-wide channel was declared safe, and RFA Sir Galahad (L3005) docked at Umm Qasr and began offloading hundreds of tons of food and water for the Iraqis. Work continued for weeks after that, widening the channel.
- This history has been assembled from a variety of sources, many of them "at the time" news articles. Thus, while every effort has been made to ensure it is accurate, it suffers from gaps in its coverage.
