USS Nicholas (FFG-47)

4100 tons

138.1 meters

13.5 meters

7.5 meters

17 officers, 198 sailors

1 propeller, 2 gas turbines driven; 41,000 shaft horsepower

29 nodes

1 76 mm gun, two torpedo launchers. Disarmed: 1 rocket starter

The USS Nicholas ( FFG -47 ) is a frigate of the United States Navy and is part of the Oliver Hazard Perry - class. It was named after Samuel Nicholas, the first Commandant of the Marine Corps.

History

FFG- 47 was commissioned in 1980 and placed in September 1982 at Bath Iron Works in Kiel. In April 1983, the frigate was launched and was baptized. Godmother was Elizabeth Tryon, a descendant of Nicholas', which had already been baptized in 1942, the USS Nicholas ( DD -449 ). In March 1984, the frigate USS Nicholas was found to be in service.

In 1988 the frigate participated in the operation Earnest Will and escorting tankers through the Strait of Hormuz. Two years later, during the Gulf War, the frigate was again in the Persian Gulf. There she was protecting inter alia, the battleships USS Missouri (BB- 63) and USS Wisconsin ( BB -64) during Küstenbeschießungen. 1993 drove the Nicholas in the Mediterranean, 1995, she participated in Operation Sharp Guard.

2003 visited the frigate St. Petersburg and, as the first U.S. warship ever, Neum in Bosnia and Herzegovina. She then took part in a Proliferation Security Exercise in the Mediterranean. 2005 and 2006 was followed by runs at the side of USS Saipan (LHA -2 ) and USS Enterprise ( CVN -65). 2010 drove the Nicholas for defense against piracy off the coast of Somalia and Kenya. On 30 March, the frigate of suspected pirate ships learned in their region. She started from this and could after they had been fired upon by the pirates, forcing the three -man crew by machine-gun fire to the task. The ship was sunk. After this, the mother ship has been applied to the two other people were arrested.