USS ''Green Bay'' (LPD-20) is a . She is the second ship of the

United States Navy The United States Navy (USN) is the maritime service branch of the United States Armed Forces and one of the eight uniformed services of the United States. It is the largest and most powerful navy in the world, with the estimated tonnage ...

to be named for the city and bay of Green Bay, Wisconsin. The contract to build her was awarded to

Northrop Grumman Ship Systems Northrop Grumman Ship Systems (NGSS) was a former sector or division of Northrop Grumman Corporation which was responsible for building small and medium shipping products. It was merged with another sector of Northrop Grumman, Northrop Grumman Ne ...

New Orleans, Louisiana New Orleans ( , ,New Orleans

, on 30 May 2000 and her

keel The keel is the bottom-most longitudinal structural element on a vessel. On some sailboats, it may have a hydrodynamic and counterbalancing purpose, as well. As the laying down of the keel is the initial step in the construction of a ship, in Br ...

was

laid down Laying the keel or laying down is the formal recognition of the start of a ship's construction. It is often marked with a ceremony attended by dignitaries from the shipbuilding company and the ultimate owners of the ship. Keel laying is one o ...

on 11 August 2003. ''Green Bay'' was christened on 15 July 2006 and commissioned on 24 January 2009. Rose Magnus, the wife of Assistant Commandant of the Marine Corps General Robert Magnus, served as the ship's sponsor. ''Green Bay'' is assigned to the

U.S. Pacific Fleet The United States Pacific Fleet (USPACFLT) is a theater-level component command of the United States Navy, located in the Pacific Ocean. It provides naval forces to the Indo-Pacific Command. Fleet headquarters is at Joint Base Pearl Harbor� ...

, and her home port was Naval Base San Diego, until 2015 when she was forward deployed to

United States Fleet Activities Sasebo U.S. Fleet Activities Sasebo is a United States Navy base, in Sasebo, Japan, on the island of Kyūshū. It provides facilities for the logistic support of forward-deployed units and visiting operating forces of the United States Pacific Fleet ...

in Sasebo, Nagasaki, Japan. The ship's name has resulted in a close connection to the people of Green Bay, Wisconsin, and their professional football team, the Green Bay Packers. The ship's flight deck is named "Lambeau Field" after the name of the Packers' stadium. Green Bay businesses and residents presented the ship with a truckload of Packerland memorabilia for her 2009 commissioning.

AV-8B Harrier testing

In 2009, Air Test and Evaluation Squadron 31 (VX-31) and ''Green Bay'' tested the feasibility of using the ''San Antonio''-class LPDs for AV-8B Harrier IIs

V/STOL A vertical and/or short take-off and landing (V/STOL) aircraft is an airplane able to take-off or land vertically or on short runways. Vertical takeoff and landing (VTOL) aircraft are a subset of V/STOL craft that do not require runways at a ...

attack aircraft in emergency situations. The AV-8Bs were used in numerous tests for the ''San Antonio''-class's aviation certification, as well testing the effect of exhaust heat on the flight deck.

Service history

The ship went on her first deployment in February 2011 with the three-ship

Amphibious Ready Group An amphibious ready group (ARG) of the United States Navy consists of a naval element—a group of warships known as an Amphibious Task Force (ATF)—and a landing force (LF) of U.S. Marines (and occasionally U.S. Army soldiers), in total about ...

. The group, comprising 4,000 sailors and Marines from the

13th Marine Expeditionary Unit The 13th Marine Expeditionary Unit (13th MEU) is one of seven Marine Expeditionary Units currently in existence in the United States Marine Corps. The Marine Expeditionary Unit is a Marine Air Ground Task Force with a strength of about 2,200 p ...

, deployed for seven months to the United States Fifth and

Seventh Fleet The Seventh Fleet is a numbered fleet of the United States Navy. It is headquartered at U.S. Fleet Activities Yokosuka, in Yokosuka, Kanagawa Prefecture, Japan. It is part of the United States Pacific Fleet. At present, it is the largest of ...

areas in the Asian region. In March 2011, ''Green Bay'' was scheduled to assisted in

Operation Tomodachi was a United States Armed Forces (especially U.S. Forces Japan) assistance operation to support Japan in disaster relief following the 2011 Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami. The operation took place from 12 March to 4 May 2011; involved 24,000 U ...

, the relief efforts after the massive

2011 Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami The occurred at 14:46 JST (05:46 UTC) on 11 March. The magnitude 9.0–9.1 (M) undersea megathrust earthquake had an epicenter in the Pacific Ocean, east of the Oshika Peninsula of the Tōhoku region, and lasted approximately six mi ...

struck Japan. She was instead rerouted into Operation Enduring Freedom areas and never made it to Japan. In May 2013, ''Green Bay'' returned from an eight-month deployment to the Middle East and Asia as part of the Amphibious Ready Group, along with the

15th Marine Expeditionary Unit The 15th Marine Expeditionary Unit (15th MEU) is one of seven such units currently in existence in the United States Marine Corps. The Marine Expeditionary Unit (MEU) is a Marine Air Ground Task Force (MAGTF) with a strength of about 2,200 pe ...

. In January 2015, ''Green Bay'' was forward deployed to the 7th Fleet replacing in the Amphibious Ready Group homeported at

. On 5 August 2017, a U.S. Marine Corps

MV-22 Osprey The Bell Boeing V-22 Osprey is an American multi-mission, tiltrotor military aircraft with both vertical takeoff and landing (VTOL) and short takeoff and landing (STOL) capabilities. It is designed to combine the functionality of a convention ...

struck ''Green Bay'' after taking off from USS ''Bonhomme Richard''. The helicopter then crashed in

Shoalwater Bay Shoalwater Bay is a large bay on the Capricorn Coast of Central Queensland, Australia 100 km north of the coastal town of Yeppoon and 628 km north-north-west of the state capital, Brisbane. Since 1966, the land surrounding Shoalwater Ba ...

on the east coast of Australia. 23 personnel were rescued, with three confirmed dead. In May 2022, ''Green Bay'' was a part of the Amphibious Ready Group in Sasebo.

References

This article contains information from the

Naval Vessel Registry The ''Naval Vessel Register'' (NVR) is the official inventory of ships and service craft in custody of or titled by the United States Navy. It contains information on ships and service craft that make up the official inventory of the Navy from t ...

and various other U.S. Navy Web sites.

External links

USS ''Green Bay'' official website

{{DEFAULTSORT:Green Bay (Lpd-20) San Antonio-class amphibious transport docks Ships built in Bridge City, Louisiana 2006 ships