USS Fort Snelling (LSD-30)

Career
Awarded:	28 February 1952
Laid down:	17 August 1953
Launched:	16 July 1954
Commissioned:	24 January 1955
Decommissioned:	28 September 1984
Struck:	24 February 1992
Fate:	Sold for scrap, 25 August 1995
General Characteristics
Displacement:	11,525 tons (full), 8,899 tons (light)
Length:	510 ft (155 m)
Beam:	84 ft (25.6 m)
Draft:	19 ft (5.8 m)
Propulsion:	2 steam turbines, 2 shafts, 23,000 shp (17 MW)
Speed:	21 knots (39 km/h)
Complement:	304 with accommodations for 300 more combat troops
Armament:	4×2 3 in (76 mm) / 50 cal., 6×2 20 mm AA guns
Boat capacity (well deck):	21 LCM 6s
Aircraft:	up to 8 helicopters

USS Fort Snelling (LSD-30) was a Thomaston-class dock landing ship of the United States Navy. She was named for Fort Snelling at the confluence of the Minnesota and Mississippi Rivers, for many years the northernmost military post in the land of the Sioux and Chippewa. She was the second ship assigned that name, but the construction of Fort Snelling (LSD-23) was canceled on 17 August 1945.

Fort Snelling (LSD-30) was laid down on 17 August 1953 by Ingalls Shipbuilding Corp., Pascagoula, Miss.; launched on 16 July 1954, sponsored by Mrs. Robert P. Briscoe, wife of Vice Admiral Briscoe; and commissioned on 24 January 1955, Commander H. Marvin-Smith in command.

Homeported at Norfolk, Va., Fort Snelling carried out an intensive exercise schedule along the east coast and in the Caribbean, almost always with Marines embarked for amphibious training. She made her first deployment to the Mediterranean in 1956, returning the next year again to serve with the 6th Fleet. During her 1958 deployment, she was at sea bound for the island of Rhodes when on 14 July she was notified to land her Marines at Beirut, Lebanon, the next day. Thus, Fort Snelling took part in the immediate response of the U.S. Navy to the Middle Eastern crisis of summer 1958. Several times more before leaving the Mediterranean she returned to the coast of Lebanon to support the Marines ashore. Through 1959 and 1963, Fort Snelling continued her training operations with marines in the Caribbean and on the Carolina coast.

Fort Snelling was decommissioned 28 September 1984 and transferred to the Maritime Administration (MARAD) 7 September 1989. Her name was struck from the Naval Vessel Register 24 February 1992 and she was sold for scrapping 25 August 1995 to Peck Recycling, Richmond, VA, for $268,707.

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Thomaston class dock landing ships

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