Page 25: of Maritime Reporter Magazine (December 1993)

Gore Speaks At Carrier Christening

In Newport News

Vice President A1 Gore was the principal speaker at the christen- ing of the 1,092-foot-long Nimitz

Class nuclear aircraft carrier John

C. Stennis (CVN 74) at Newport

News Shipbuilding (NNS), Newport

News, Va. An estimated 3,000 people showed for the event on

Thursday, November 11 — Veter- ans Day.

The Vice President said in his remarks that while military power assists short-term national secu- rity, economic power is essential in the long-term. "Now that the Cold

War is over, the shipbuilding in- dustry faces a new challenge.

American shipbuilders must trans- fer their technical skills from the military to the commercial mar- ket," Mr. Gore said. He reassured those present that the Administra- tion would help, citing the five- point plan President Clinton de- livered to Congress October 1 to revitalize the shipbuilding indus- try. He said the plan would "supply important assistance for this tal- ented work force here at Newport

News — and in other shipyards around the country."

Other speakers at the ceremony included John H. Dalton, secre- tary of the Navy, who introduced

Mr. Gore; Sen. Thad Cochran,

Miss.; Sen. Charles Robb, Va.;

Sen. John Warner, Va.; Dana

Mead, chief operating officer of

Tenneco Inc., NNS's parent com- pany; and W.R. "Pat" Phillips, Jr., president and CEO of NNS.

The Stennis was christened by

Margaret Stennis Womble, daughter of the man it was named for, who smashed the bottle across the Stennis's bow with a single stroke, predicting good luck for the ship. The end of the ceremony was punctuated by an impressive fly- over by four screaming jets in close formation.

Before it is completed and deliv- ered in 1996, the Stennis will take about 40 million man-hours and al- most five years to construct, incor- porating 47,000 tons of structural steel and about a million pounds of aluminum. The Stennis towers twenty stories above the waterline and is almost as long as the Empire

State Building is tall. It will be the home for about 6,000. It is capable of 30-plus knots, has two reactors which can operate 20 years without refuel- ing, and can remain operational for half a century.

There have been six other Nimitz

Class carriers: the Nimitz, the

Dwight D. Eisenhower, Carl Vinson,

Theodore Roosevelt, Abraham Lin- coln and George Washington. The next Nimitz Class carrier, the United

Vice President Al Gore spoke on the future of U.S. shipyards when the John C. Stennis aircraft car- rier was christened at Newport News.

States, is scheduled for christening in 1996. The Enterprise (CVN 65), the first nuclear aircraft carrier, was delivered by NNS in 1961 and is now undergoing a major overhaul and refueling there.

Sen. Warner of the Armed Ser- vices Committee announced at the christening that the Senate had approved $1.2 billion for yet an- other nuclear aircraft carrier, CVN 76.

Former Mississippi State Sena- tor John C. Stennis, age 92, for whom the aircraft carrier was named, was a Senate advocate of military strength and served 41 years under eight presidents, be- ginning with Harry Truman in 1947 and ending with Ronald

Reagan in 1988. He retired from the Senate in 1988 and now resides in Madison, Miss.

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Navy Secretary Dalton

Lauds Gore, And NAFTA

In Secretary of the Navy John

Dalton's introduction of the Vice

President, he lauded Gore's ef- forts on behalf of the North Ameri- can Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), which at press time had just passed the House of Rep- resentatives. "He has stood tall in the championing of the North

American Free Trade Agreement, which means a much brighter economic future for us all. People ask me why I'm so interested in

NAFTA ... I know in order to build carriers like this, and the air wings that will be aboard her, and the other ships that will be part of her battle group, a grow- ing economy and a strong indus- trial base are absolutely essen- tial. It is only through wise trade policy like NAFTA that we will be able to maintain an economy that will adequately support our na- tional defense needs. Al Gore is leading a fight for both a healthy economy and a strong defense."

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