USS Texas (CGN-39)

USS Texas (DLGN/CGN-39) was the second Virginia-class nuclear guided missile cruiser. She was the third ship to be named in honor of Texas, a region that, after being taken from its natives by first Spain and then Mexico, and later becoming an independent republic, was admitted to the United States as the 28th state on 29 December 1845.

Texas's keel was laid down on 18 August 1973, at Newport News, Virginia, by the Newport News Shipbuilding and Drydock Company. She was initially designated a guided missile frigate, but was reclassified as a guided missile cruiser and given the hull classification symbol CGN-39 on 30 June 1975. She was launched on 9 August 1975, sponsored by Mrs. Dolph Briscoe, wife of the Governor of Texas, and commissioned on 10 September 1977, with Captain Peter B. Fiedler in command.

Following a nine-week test of the ship's combat systems, Texas loaded weapons at the Yorktown Naval Weapons station in October and underwent refresher training out of Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, in November. Texas spent the first three months of 1978 conducting at-sea evaluation of her propulsion and weapons systems off the Virginia Capes and in the Caribbean Sea. On 28 March, she transited to her building yard at Newport News to commence a Post Shakedown Availability (PSA) which was completed on 31 July. The remainder of 1978 was spent in individual ship exercises off the east coast and Roosevelt Roads, Puerto Rico, interspersed with periods in Texas' home port of Norfolk, Virginia.

Texas was placed in reserve commission on 31 May 1993, then decommissioned and stricken from the Naval Vessel Register on 16 July 1993. Texas entered the nuclear Ship-Submarine recycling program at Puget Sound Naval Shipyard on 1 October 1999.

General Characteristics

• Displacement: 11,000 tons full
• Length: 585 feet
• Beam: 63 feet
• Draft: 31 feet
• Machinery: 2 General Electric D2G reactors, geared turbines, 2 screws, 60,000 horsepower
• Speed: 30 knots
• Complement: 39 officers, 539 men
• Armament
  • two five-inch/54-caliber Mk-45 lightweight guns
  • 2 MK-26 SAM/ASW (68 Missiles)
  • six 12.75-inch torpedo tubes (two triple mounts)
  • two Mk-26 missile launchers for Standard missiles and ASROC
  • two Mk-141 AGM-84 Harpoon missile launchers
  • two armored box launchers for Tomahawk ASM/LAM
  • two 20mm Phalanx CIWS
  • four machine guns

For the other ships of the United States Navy that have borne the name USS Texas, see that index page.