USS Jacksonville (SSN-699)

USS Jacksonville (on the right) in 2003
History
United States
Name:	USS Jacksonville
Namesake:	City of Jacksonville, Florida
Ordered:	24 January 1972
Builder:	General Dynamics Electric Boat
Laid down:	21 February 1976
Launched:	18 November 1978
Commissioned:	16 May 1981
Status:	in active service
Badge:
General characteristics
Class and type:	Los Angeles-class submarine
Displacement:	5,720 tons light, 6,149 tons full, 429 tons dead
Length:	110.3 m (362 ft)
Beam:	10 m (33 ft)
Draft:	9.7 m (32 ft)
Propulsion:	One S6G reactor
Complement:	12 officers, 98 men

USS Jacksonville (SSN-699), a Los Angeles-class attack submarine, is the only ship of the United States Navy to be named for Jacksonville, Florida. The ship is nicknamed "The Bold One". The contract to build her was awarded to the Electric Boat Division of General Dynamics Corporation in Groton, Connecticut on 24 January 1972 and her keel was laid down on 21 February 1976. She was launched on 18 November 1978 using the pontoon system designed for the launching of the Ohio Class Trident Submarines. The Jacksonville was sponsored by Mrs. Charles E. Bennett, and commissioned on 16 May 1981, with Captain Robert B. Wilkinson in command.

Jacksonville’s operations have included a variety of fleet exercises and deployments including two around-the-world cruises in 1982 and 1985, deployments to the western Atlantic Ocean in 1983, 1986, 1993 and 1994, and deployments to the Mediterranean Sea in 1987 and 1993. In 1988, Jacksonville participated in a shock trials test program for Los Angeles class submarines, which was followed by a three-year major modernization overhaul in Norfolk Naval Shipyard.

Jacksonville has been involved in several collisions with other vessels during her over 30 years of operation:

(1) While outbound with the inbound Turkish merchant vessel General Z. Dogan in the vicinity of Norfolk, Virginia on 22 March 1982,^[1]

(2) with a barge positioned across Chesapeake Bay's Thimble Shoal Channel, requiring the replacement of the submarine's sonar dome, on 21 September 1984,^[2]

(3) with the container ship Saudi Makkah near the mouth of the Chesapeake Bay, requiring repairs to the submarine's fairwater planes and rudder, on 17 May 1996,^[3][4] and

(4) with an unnamed fishing vessel while on regular patrol in the Persian Gulf on 10 January 2013. The ship's main periscope was sheared off in the collision.^[5] The ship's commanding and executive officers were relieved for cause following the incident.^[6]

In late 2009, the Jacksonville's homeport was moved from Norfolk to Pearl Harbor.^[7]

On 20 December 2004 a small fire broke out aboard Jacksonville while she was undergoing a refueling overhaul at the Portsmouth Naval Shipyard. The fire was immediately extinguished and the reactor was never in danger, though a shipyard firefighter and a sailor were treated at the scene for smoke inhalation.

References

This article includes information collected from the Naval Vessel Register as well as various press releases and news stories.

• Sublant Fact sheet on the U.S.S. Jacksonville.

1. http://www.history.navy.mil/shiphist/j/ssn-699/1982.pdf
2. http://www.history.navy.mil/shiphist/j/ssn-699/1983-84.pdf
3. http://www.history.navy.mil/shiphist/j/ssn-699/1996.pdf
4. "Sub, Ship Collide In Fog Off Coast". tribunedigital-dailypress.
5. "Hawaii-Based US Navy Sub Damaged in Persian Gulf". Yahoo! News (Honolulu). Associated Press. 10 January 2013. Retrieved 8 January 2016.
6. Commander Task Force 54 Public Affairs (10 February 2013). "USS Jacksonville Commanding Officer and Executive Officer Relieved of Duty". Navy News Service. US Navy. Retrieved 10 January 2016.
7. Submarine Excitement Heads West. US Navy. Undersea Warfare Fall 2009 Issue No. 41.