USS Mount Whitney (LCC-JCC 20)

Spent 3 years on the Whitney. Sure has changed since "76. 3"50's and sparrow missile launchers are gone. Was 2nd Fleets flagship back then with VADM Shanahan as CO.

IS that the now Rear Admiral Thomas Shannon is the commander of Military Sealift Command.?
http://www.navy.mil/navydata/bios/navybio.asp?bioID=509

@Bombardier Nope, 2 different Adm's. Shannon is much younger than Shanahan and has not made Vice Adm yet.

USS MOUNT WHITNEY is the first ship in the Navy to bear the name of the 14,946-foot peak in the Sierra-Nevada range in California, the highest point in the continental United States. Aboard the MOUNT WHITNEY, the navigation, deck, engineering, laundry and galley services are provided by Military Sealift Command civil service mariners.

USS MOUNT WHITNEY assumed duties as flagship for the 2nd Fleet in 1981. The ship deployed in 1994 to Haiti with Lt. Gen. Hugh Shelton, commander of the 18th Airborne Corps, in command of the Joint Task Force that conducted Operation Uphold Democracy. On November 12, 2002, MOUNT WHITNEY deployed to the Central Command area of responsibility in support of Operation Enduring Freedom. During the deployment the ship embarked elements of the 2nd Marine Division and II Marine Expeditionary Force (II MEF), based at Camp Lejeune, N.C., under the command of Maj. Gen. John F. Sattler. In 2004, MOUNT WHITNEY deployed to the Mediterranean relieving the command ship USS LA SALLE (AGF 3) and officially becoming the flagship for Commander, 6th Fleet, in February 2005.

General Characteristics: Keel Laid: January 8, 1969
Launched: January 8, 1970
Commissioned: January 16, 1971
Builder: Newport News Shipbuilding Co., Newport News, Va.
Propulsion system: two boilers, one geared turbine
Propellers: one
Length: 636,5 feet (194 meters)
Beam: 108 feet (32.9 meters)
Draft: 26,9 feet (8.8 meters)
Displacement: approx. 18,400 tons full load
Speed: 23 knots
Aircraft: all helicopters
Armament: two 20mm Phalanx CIWS, 50 cal machine guns, 25mm guns
Homeport: Gaeta, Italy
Crew: 146 civilian crew, approx. 160 Navy crew and approx. 300 Navy staff

http://www.navysite.de/ships/lcc20.htm