USS Ponchatoula, a 38,000-ton (full load displacement) Neosho class oiler built at Camden, New Jersey, was commissioned in January 1956. Transferred to the Pacific Fleet shortly afterwards, she regularly deployed to the Far East to provide logistics support to the Seventh Fleet. While in the western Pacific Ponchatoula took part in the 1958 crisis with China over the islands of Quemoy and Matsu and played an important role in sustaining a high tempo of operations during the long conflict in Vietnam. She also participated in several manned spacecraft recovery missions between 1962 and 1968.
During the 1970s Ponchatoula's area of operations expanded into the Indian Ocean and Persian Gulf, reflecting growing U.S. Navy activity in that part of the Globe. In September 1980 the ship was transferred to the Military Sealift Command, becoming USNS Ponchatoula (T-AO-148) and beginning operation with a mainly civilian crew. Based at Subic Bay for most of the next decade, she continued her underway replenishment work, helping maintain the Navy's mobility and striking power in an often troubled region. USNS Ponchatoula was inactivated in February 1992 and laid up at Suisun Bay, California. Though stricken from the Naval Vessel Register at the end of August 1992, she remained in Navy custody until transferred to the Maritime Administration for disposal in May 1999.
This page features, or provides links to, all the views we have related to USS Ponchatoula (AO-148, later T-AO-148).
For more images concerning this ship, see:
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For more images concerning this ship, see:
If you want higher resolution reproductions than the digital images presented here, see: "How to Obtain Photographic Reproductions." |
Page made 30 December 2003