Cold Warriors in Kodachrome
Official caption: “A Helicopter Combat Support Squadron 2 (HC-2) SH-3G Sea King helicopter takes off from the stern of the dock landing ship USS Mount Vernon (LSD 39). A Mark 33 3-inch/50-caliber anti-aircraft gun is in the foreground.”
Note that the autoloaders on the Mk33 are filled with 13-pound shells at the ready while the Sea King, likely of the “Desert Ducks” detachment out of Bahrain, has a beautiful full-color livery.
U.S. Navy image DN-ST-88-03592 via NARA.
Filed October 1987 in the Persian Gulf by PH2 (SW) Jeffrey Elliott, this image dates from Operation Earnest Will in the midst of the Tanker War phase of the Iran-Iraq war which saw Kuwaiti-owned tankers reflagged as American vessels and placed under the protection of the Navy.
Mount Vernon, a 14,000-ton Anchorage-class dock landing ship, was commissioned in 1972 and, as with the other four members of her class, had been fitted with a quartet of MK 33 twin 3-inch AAA DP mounts when constructed, a system that first entered service in 1948.
Another Mount Vernon shot from 1987. The 16-ton MK33 twin mount had a AAA ceiling of 30,400 feet and a surface engagement range of 14,600 yards, capable of 40-50 rounds per minute per gun, at least until the auto-loader ran out. They required an 11-man crew. It was believed one Mk33 was successful in an AAA role, with USS Biddle (DLG-34) credited with damaging a North Vietnamese MiG fighter in the Tonkin Gulf on 19 July 1972.
The fire-control directors for these dated mounts, of questionable use even in the 1970s, were removed from the Anchorage class during the Carter administration, while the first two tubs and then the last four were deleted by the early 1990s as the weapon was sunsetted. They were replaced by a pair of CIWS and another pair of Mk 38 25mm chain guns during late-career refits.
Mount Vernon would be decommissioned on 25 July 2003, the same year the last of her class left active service and was sunk as a target two years later.
The last 3-inch guns in U.S. maritime service were the 3″/50 singles on the 210-foot Reliance class cutters of the Coast Guard, which were removed during the completion of the cutters’ midlife maintenance availability in 1996.
As for the mighty Sea King, which first entered Navy service in 1961, they retired in late 2006 when the final unarmed UH-3H model was paid off from support duty at the Pacific Missile Range Facility, although the “white top” VH-3Ds of Marine One would continue to serve for much longer.
A U.S. Navy Sikorsky VH-3A Sea King (BuNo 150613) and an SH-3G of Helicopter Combat Support Squadron 2 (HC-2) stand on the flight line following their arrival at the Naval Air Station Oceana, Virginia (USA), in 1991. HC-2 was the last squadron that operated the type, finally retiring them in 2006 for H-60 models. Photo by Capt. Joe Mancias, USN – U.S. DefenseImagery photo VIRIN: DN-ST-91-07128.
