Historic Jet Aircraft on the USS Midway Aircraft Carrier Flight Deck, San Diego, California

In August 2006 I toured the USS Midway Aircraft Carrier which was made into a memorial and museum in San Diego. Is this ship ever huge, and full of history. On the flight deck actual retired jet fighter pilots tell you what it was really like to take off and land on the USS Midway. The entire ship is extremely interesting and I highly recommend you visit the USS Midway if you get the opportunity.

 

INFORMATION ON THE USS MIDWAY:

 

USS Midway (CVB/CVA/CV-41) was an aircraft carrier of the United States Navy, the lead ship of her class, and the first to be commissioned after the end of World War II. Active in the Vietnam War and in Operation Desert Storm, as of 2007 she is a museum ship in San Diego, California. She is the only remaining aircraft carrier of the World War II era that is not an Essex-class ship.

 

In August 1991, Midway departed Yokosuka and returned to Pearl Harbor and then sailed to San Diego where she was decommissioned at Naval Air Station North Island on 11 April 1992. She was stricken from the Naval Vessel Register on 17 March 1997.

 

On 30 September 2003, Midway began her journey from the Navy Inactive Ship Maintenance Facility, Bremerton, Washington, to San Diego, California in preparation for use as a museum and memorial.

 

On 10 January 2004 the ship was moored at her final location at the Broadway Pier in downtown San Diego, where she was opened to the public on 7 June 2004. Visitors may tour the ship's flight deck, hangar bay, mess hall, bridge, primary flight control area, enlisted and junior officer quarters, sickbay, and portions of the engine rooms.

 

(Source: Wikipedia)

 

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USS Midway: San Diego Aircraft Carrier Museum - “Midway Magic” is a historical fact. It was a term known throughout the Navy as the USS Midway steamed through a 47-year career of service to country. Imagine a carrier that was commissioned in 1945 and served as a flagship in Desert Storm in 1991. No other carrier served as long as the USS Midway. Time and again Midway remained on station when other carriers broke down and headed for port. It was almost magical how the crew and carrier responded to every call—both military and humanitarian.

 

The USS Midway set new standards of naval aviation in the latter half of the 20th century. A captured German V-2 rocket was launched off the USS Midway in 1947—the dawn of naval missile warfare. The USS Midway blazed new trails of sub-Arctic air operations off the coast of Greenland. It was the first carrier home-ported in a foreign country, calling Yokosuka, Japan home for 18 years. When others came home, the USS Midway remained at the “tip of the sword” on an odyssey shared by 225,000 Americans that spanned the surrender of Japan in WWII, the Cold War, Vietnam, the era of détente and Desert Storm.

 

No other carrier carries such a proud—many say “magical”—tradition of diligence, vigilance and mission completion. Midway Magic was real. And it continues today on her final mission as an interactive museum, tribute and education center.

 

(Source: www.ussmidway.org)

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