SAN FRANCISCO — In 2005, the aircraft carrier USS America was towed out to sea on her final voyage. Hundreds of miles off the Atlantic coast, Navy personnel then blasted the 40-year-old warship with missiles and bombs until it sank.
The massive Kitty Hawk-class carrier — more than three football fields long — came to rest in the briny depths about 300 nautical miles southeast of Norfolk, Va.
Target practice is how the Navy gets rid of most of its old ships, an Associated Press review of Navy records for the past dozen years has found. And they wind up at the bottom of the ocean, bringing with them amounts of toxic waste that are only estimated.
Navy documents state that among the toxic substances left onboard the America were more than 500 pounds of PCBs, polychlorinated biphenyls, a chemical banned by the U.S. in 1979, in part because it is long-lasting and accumulates throughout the food chain. Disposing of the carrier that served in the Vietnam War, Desert Storm and Desert Shield cost more than $22 million.
In the past 12 years, records show the Navy has used missiles, torpedoes and large guns to sink 109 old, peeling and rusty warships off the coasts of California, Hawaii, Florida and other states. During the same period, 64 ships were recycled at one of six approved domestic ship-breaking facilities.
The Navy says target practice on actual military ships serves an important national security function, allowing for live-fire exercises and study of “weapons lethality.” But the AP found that the Navy has struggled to balance its military training needs with an environmentally sound way to send ships to the grave.
The program — called “Sinkex,” for sinking exercise— has come under fire from environmentalists for the pollutants it introduces to the sea. The ship-recycling industry complains about the jobs and revenues it takes away.
Evidence from a Florida ship sinking site suggests these old warships can cause spikes in PCB levels in nearby fish. It spurred Florida officials to bar further dumping along their coast. And it has evoked a federal lawsuit alleging the EPA has failed to properly safeguard federal waters.
Along with the memories of sailors who once lived on these ghost ships, the massive boats can contain thousands of pounds of PCBs, asbestos, lead, mercury and other harmful substances in keels, insulation materials, wiring and felt gaskets.
The EPA and the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention say PCBs endure for years.
Under its agreement with the EPA, the Navy must document how much toxic material is removed and how much is sent into the sea. But the AP review of the Navy’s year-end reports since 2000 found incomplete and inconsistent estimates of PCBs and other toxics.
For example, from 2000 to 2004, the Navy reported only the estimated weight of a certain type of felt gasket that contains PCBs, rather than all materials containing PCBs.
“The Navy’s PCB volume estimates and self-reporting methods are questionable,” said Colby Self of the environmental group Basel Action Network, which along with the Sierra Club sued the EPA. “Yet the EPA continues to disregard the Navy’s self-reporting shortfalls and defend legal exemptions that allow the Navy to dump toxic waste ships at sea.”
The Navy defended its cleaning and inventory process, saying it removes all liquid PCBs, thousands of gallons of fuel, mercury from instruments and other pollutants.
By the numbers
109
Number of warships sunk by the Navy over the past 12 years
64
Old warships that were recycled during the same period
$500,000
Approximate cost to remove toxins from a ship before it is sunk in target practice, according to the Navy
$22 million
Cost of disposing the USS America, which was sunk 300 miles off the Virginia coast in 2005
