USS General Harry Taylor (AP-145)

"General Harry Taylor" was then transferred to the U.S. Air Force on 15 July 1961 and was renamed USAFS "General Hoyt S. Vandenberg" on 11 June 1963.

On 1 July 1964, "General Hoyt S. Vandenberg" was acquired by the Navy and designated T-AGM-10, as a Missile Range Instrumentation Ship, one of ten such ships transferred from the Commander, Air Force Eastern Test Range, to MSTS. "Equipped with extremely accurate and discriminating radar and telemetry equipment," she tracked and analyzed "re-entry bodies in the terminal phase of ballistic missile test flights," carrying out those missile and spacecraft tracking duties in both Atlantic and Pacific waters until her retirement in 1983. She was ultimately stricken from the Naval Vessel Register on 29 April 1993.

In 1998, some scenes of the horror/sci-fi film "Virus" were filmed aboard the ex-"General Hoyt S. Vandenberg". The ship substituted for a Russian vessel, and some Cyrillic lettering applied for the film is still visible on the hull today.

The ship was transferred to the Maritime Administration on 1 May 1999. Her projected transfer to the state of Florida, for use as an artificial reef, received approval on 13 February 2007. The ship will be sited 6 miles (10 km) off the Florida Keys in the Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuary. The sinking was originally set to take place on 15 May 2008 but was postponed because of cost overruns incurred during the ship's cleanup. A new date will be set after funding issues are resolved, and would most likely be after the 2008 hurricane season. [cite press release | title = Vandenberg sink date postponed | url = http://www.bigshipwrecks.com/ | publisher = Artificial Reefs of the Keys | date = | accessdate = 2008-08-04 ]

See also

* Missile Range Instrumentation Ship

References

* A second entry can be found [http://www.history.navy.mil/danfs/g3/general_hoyt_s_vandenberg.htm here] .

External links

* [http://maps.google.com/maps?ll=37.120051,-76.644949&spn=0.002481,0.005021&t=k&z=18&om=1 Satellite image] of USNS "General Hoyt S. Vandenberg" in the James River as part of the National Defense Reserve Fleet (third from right in image).