USS Carl Vinson (CVN-70)

The USS Carl Vinson returning home following support of Operation Enduring Freedom
Career
Laid down:	11 October 1975
Launched:	15 March 1980
Commissioned:	13 March 1982
Fate:	on active service
General Characteristics
Displacement:	78,180 t (light), 101,097 t (full)
Length:	1,092 ft
Beam:	134 ft
Extreme Width:	252 ft
Draft:	31 ft
Speed:	35 knots
Complement:	3,200 officers and men
Armament:	3 Sea Sparrow Surface-to-air missiles, 4 x 20mm CIWS
Aircraft:	85-90
Nickname:	Starship Vinson

The 1,092-foot USS Carl Vinson is a United States Navy Nimitz class aircraft carrier commissioned in 1982, which carries F/A-18 Hornets and F-14 Tomcats as well as surveillance and other aircraft. It can carry 85 planes and 5,500 personnel. Very few ships of the United States Navy have been named for a person who was alive at the time of the christening; the list includes Carl Vinson (CVN-70), Arleigh Burke (DDG-51), Jimmy Carter (SSN-23), Ronald Reagan (CVN-76), Hyman G. Rickover (SSN-709), Bob Hope (T-AKR-300), and George H. W. Bush (CVN-77).

A member of the United States House of Representatives for fifty years, Carl Vinson was, for twenty-nine years, the Chairman of the House Naval Affairs and Armed Services Committee.

Nimitz-class aircraft carrier

Nimitz | Dwight D. Eisenhower | Carl Vinson | Theodore Roosevelt | Abraham Lincoln | George Washington | John C. Stennis | Harry S. Truman | Ronald Reagan | [[USS George H. W. Bush (CVN-77)| George H. W. Bush]]

List of aircraft carriers of the United States Navy