Edited for brevity. Hat tip to Hell in a Handbasket.
On 21 July 2003 in a SINKEX operation by the US Navy, the USS Samuel Gompers AD-37 and two other ships were sent to the bottom of the Atlantic ocean off the coast of North Carolina. The ships involved in the SINKEX included the famed USS Cole. Of the three ships destroyed, the Gompers was the last to be sunk and slipped beneath the waves at 0006 22 July 2003. The first Harpoon missile to strike the Gompers was from the USS Cole, designation: Cole 4. Reports indicate it took 16 Harpoon missiles (400 lbs each) and over 40,000 pounds of ordinance to sink the Gompers. When the Harpoons finished, a squadron of bombers dropped 2,000 pound bombs on her to sink her.
They have a few pix of the Harpoon launches, but they’re working to get a video and more pix of the actual sinkings, so it might be worthwhile to bookmark and check back periodically. |