USS Los Alamos

Career
Name:	USS Los Alamos
Builder:	Chicago Bridge & Iron Company (4 sections) Pollock Stockton Shipbuilding Co. (2 sections) Pittsburgh Des Moines Steel Co. (1 section)
Launched:	March 1945
Decommissioned:	early 1990's
Reclassified:	AFDB-7 (Large Auxiliary Floating Dry Dock), 10 November 1961
Fate:	Disassembled
General characteristics
Type:	Floating drydock
Displacement:	30,800 long tons (31,294 t)
Length:	825 ft 3 in (251.5 m)
Beam:	246 ft 5 in (75.1 m)
Draft:	8 ft 8 in (2.6 m)
Propulsion:	None
Complement:	187
Armament:	• 14 × 40 mm guns • 14 × 20 mm guns

ABSD-7, an advanced base sectional dock, was constructed of seven advance base docks (ABD) as follows: ABD-37, ABD-38, ABD-39, and ABD-40 were built by Chicago Bridge & Iron Company, Morgan City, Louisiana, and completed in December 1944 and January and February 1945; ABD-51 and ABD-52 were built by Pollock Stockton Shipbuilding Co., Stockton, California, and completed in January and March 1945; and ABD-58 was built by Pittsburgh Des Moines Steel Co., Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and completed in October 1944.

Mare Island

The seven advance base docks were towed to Mare Island Navy Yard where they were erected and assembled into ABSD-7. Completed in March 1945, the advance base section dock began duty at Mare Island, and she served there until placed on the inactive list in March 1946. Subsequently, she reclassified to AFDB*7, an auxiliary floating drydock, in August 1946. She was disassembled and towed to the east coast where she entered the Atlantic Reserve Fleet at Green Cove Springs, Florida, in January 1947.

Holy Loch

Early in 1961, four sections – "A", "B", "C", and "D" – of AFDB‑7 were towed across the Atlantic Ocean to Holy Loch, Scotland, where on 3 March 1961 the Navy established an important base for fleet ballistic submarines. A detachment of Seabees from MCB-4 erected and assembled the four sections. Completed 10 November, the auxiliary floating drydock was placed in service as Los Alamos (AFDB-7).

Assigned to SUBRON 14, Los Alamos began drydock service for the FBM boats.

Converted for use by submarines, she had the following characteristics:

• Displacement: 18,795 long tons (19,097 t)
• Length: 513 ft (156 m)
• Draft: 9 ft 3 in (2.8 m) light, 67 ft 4 in (20.5 m) submerged
• Complement: 143
• Armament: none

Los Alamos (AFDB-7) at Holy Loch, Scotland, 19 March 1963, with USS Abraham Lincoln (SSBN-602) in the dock.

Late in 1961 she carried out her first SSBN drydocking of USS George Washington (SSBN-598). She then served submarines of the "Highland Squadron" at Holy Loch. She supported refit and repair operations by submarine tenders Proteus, Hunley, Holland, Simon Lake, and Canopus. In February 1964 she successfully completed the first "off center" docking of a Polaris submarine. By providing keel blocks preset for two separate classes of SSBN boats, Los Alamos "added immeasurably to the site’s repair flexibility." Into 1969 she continued to provide docking services for Polaris submarines, whenever needed in weather foul or fair.

In the early 1990's Los Alamos was disassembled into sections and returned to the United States. In 1996 six of the original ABSD-7 sections transferred to the Brownsville Navigation District, Texas. Another had been turned over to the U.S. Army in 1968.

References

This article includes text from the public domain Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships. The entry can be found here.

External links

• Service Ship Photo Archive: ABSD-7 / AFDB-7 Los Alamos
• Naval Historical Center