USS Iwo Jima (LHD-7)

40,650 tons

257.2 meters

33.5 meters

8.2 meters

104 officers, 1004 sailors, up to 1894 troops

2 propellers, 2 steam turbine driven; 70,000 shaft horsepower

20 nodes

2 Starter RAM, 2 starters Sea Sparrow, various gun

The USS Iwo Jima (LHD -7) is an amphibious assault ship of the Wasp class.

History

Work on the Iwo Jima began on the site of the Ingalls shipyard on 3 September 1996, the keel was laid on 12 December 1997, on February 4, 2000, the launching. The USS Iwo Jima was christened on March 25, 2000 in Pascagoula, Mississippi by Mrs. Zandra Krulak, wife of General Charles C. Krulak, a former Commandant of the Marine Corps. After April 2001, the Indienststellungsmannschaft had gone on board, the ship left on its maiden voyage on 23 June 2001. 2000 World War II veterans of the Battle of Iwo Jima with her. The actual commissioning took place a week later, on June 30, 2001 in Pensacola, Florida. Home port was initially the Naval Station Norfolk and (planned) from 2014, the Naval Station Jacksonville.

The Iwo Jima and the Marines of the 26th Marine Expeditionary Unit ( MEU ) ran on 14 March 2002 in support of Operation Enduring Freedom. In 2004, the Iwo Jima at the annual Fleet Week in New York City part. On 31 August 2005, the amphibious group of Iwo Jima left Norfolk to assist in the disaster area by Hurricane Katrina. After a stop in Little Creek, where additional landing craft and transport helicopters were loaded, the ships headed for the U.S. Gulf Coast. After completion of the rescue work, the group remained until mid- September in New Orleans and returned to Norfolk on 2 October.

In June 2006, seven ships and the Marines of the 24th MEU (SOC ) Iwo Jima Expeditionary Strike Group consisting ran out to a six -month deployment in the Middle East. On July 15 they reached the command to move from the Red Sea off the coast of Lebanon to support the evacuation of U.S. citizens from the country after the departure from Lebanon after attacks by Israeli forces on infrastructure increasingly difficult had become. 2009 and 2010 took part in the Iwo Jima again the New York Fleet Week. In November 2010, the Iwo Jima helicopter launched off the coast of Haiti to bring supplies to the cyclone devastated by Hurricane Tomas regions. In 2012 she sailed as the flagship of Amphibious Ready Group in the Mediterranean.