Official: US ship in scrape now has armed escort

San Francisco Chronicle ^ | March 12, 2009 | ANNE GEARAN

[Jeff Head]

WASHINGTON — The Navy has assigned a heavily armed destroyer to escort the U.S. surveillance ship that got into a high-seas confrontation with Chinese ships last weekend.

A defense official says the Pearl Harbor-based destroyer Chung-Hoon is keeping a close eye on the unarmed sub-hunting ship Impeccable as it continues operations in the South China Sea. The official spoke on condition of anonymity to describe sensitive ship movements.

The official says the escort ship joined the Impeccable on Wednesday.

[Jeff Head]

The USS Chung-Hoon is a Burke flight IIA ship. Top of the line.

The US Navy is punctuating with this deployment that the Impeccable is operating in international waters and can and will continue its surveillance mission.

Here's a pic of the USS Chung-hoon, DDG-93.

And her specs:

Propulsion: Four General Electric LM 2500-30 gas turbines; two shafts, 100,000 total shaft horsepower

Length: 509½ feet (155.29 meters)

Beam: 59 feet (18 meters)

Displacement: 9,496 L tons (9,648.40 metric tons) full load

Speed: In excess of 30 knots.

Crew: 276 (24 officers)

: Standard Missile (SM-2MR); Vertical Launch ASROC (VLA) missiles; Tomahawk®; six Mk-46 torpedoes (from two triple tube mounts); Evolved Sea Sparrow Missile (ESSM)

: Two LAMPS Mk III MH-60 B/R helicopters with Penguin/Hellfire missiles and Mk 46/Mk 50 torpedoes.

The Chinese will have to think very hard before taking on the Chung-hoon. But they do have four very modern DDGs of their own in the South Sea fleet that would be capable of doing so.

Clearly the US is punctuating, with this deployment, that the USS Impeccable is operating in international waters and can and will continue with her surveillance.

IMHO, we should send the Stennis Carrier Strike Group (CSG), which is visiting the ROK right now, down there to ride herd on this. A CSG in the immediate area would up the any so high that the Chinese would be unable to stay in the game.

[Jeff Head]

THE RISING SEA DRAGON IN ASIA

[GeronL]

what does Chung Hoon mean ?

[Travis T. OJustice]

Good.

[AlaskaErik]

Sounds more like a name for a Chinese warship.

[GeronL]

yup.

you might be right!

[Lurking in Kansas]

....what does Chung Hoon mean ?

Oh boy, here we go...

;-)

[al baby]

Wupp a$$$

[max americana]

Chung Hoon in Mandarin means “do it again, I dare you”, right?

[Abathar]

One question - What good is an unarmed sub hunting vessel?

[b4its2late]

Everybody was Chung Hoon fighting, huh. Those cats were fast a lightning, ha.

[al baby]

Why ?

[Jeff Head]

He was a US World War II war hero in the Navy in the Pacific. Originally from Hawaii, he graduated from Annapolis in the 30s and served with distinction in the PTO.

[ArrogantBustard]

Rear Admiral Gordon Pai'ea Chung-Hoon was born on July 25, 1910, in Honolulu, Hawaii. The second youngest of five Chung-Hoon children, he attended the U.S. Naval Academy and graduated in May 1934. While at the Naval Academy, he was a valued member of the Navy Football team.

Rear Admiral Chung-Hoon is a recipient of the Navy Cross and Silver Star for conspicuous gallantry and extraordinary heroism as Commanding Officer of USS Sigsbee (DD 502) from May 1944 to October 1945. In the spring of 1945, Sigsbee assisted in the destruction of 20 enemy planes while screening a carrier strike force off the Japanese island of Kyushu. On April 14, 1945, while on radar picket station off Okinawa, a kamikaze crashed into Sigsbee, reducing her starboard engine to five knots and knocking out the ship's port engine and steering control. Despite the damage, Admiral Chung-Hoon, then a Commander, valiantly kept his anti-aircraft batteries delivering "prolonged and effective fire" against the continuing enemy air attack while simultaneously directing the damage control efforts that allowed Sigsbee to make port under her own power.

After retiring from the Navy in 1959, Rear Admiral Chung-Hoon was appointed by William Quinn, Hawaii’s first elected governor since statehood, to serve as director of the state Department of Agriculture. Rear Admiral Chung-Hoon died in July 1979.

[MediaMole]

From Navy.mil...

The ship is named in honor of Rear Adm. Gordon Paie’a Chung-Hoon, who was born and raised in Hawaii and awarded the Navy Cross and Silver Star for gallantry as Commanding Officer of USS Sigsbee during the Battle of Okinawa. Chung-Hoon was also assigned to USS Arizona during the Dec. 7, 1941 attack on Pearl Harbor.

[Jeff Head]

Nope. Admiral Chung-hoon was a US Navy war hero in World War II. Fought with valor and distinction in the PAcific.

[b4its2late]

Think the Chi Coms will moon the destroyer? I don’t.

[Blueflag]

saw that and wondered the same thing.

[peace with honor]

ROTFL!!

[Non-Sequitur]

what does Chung Hoon mean ?

Named after Gordon Chung Hoon, USNA class of 1934. He was stationed on the Arizona at Pearl Harbor, commanded the USS Sigsbee off Okinawa, and retired a Rear Admiral.