It stopped in Muscatine on the mighty Mississippi.

The weather was pretty perfect.
They were expecting between 4000 and 4500 people to visit.

My wife and I toured it in 2014 when it stopped in Chattanooga. A wonderful and very informative tour. The ship travels around using various rivers to get to their destinations. I highly recommend it to anyone if they have a chance to see it.

It’s based out of Evansville, Indiana. We toured it last year at the home port.

That would be awesome to see. We were transported across the Cua Viet River by LCU, which were actually based on an LCT. I believe Caroline County was the LST. We boarded at Dong Ha Navy "base"

Thanks for the greeat video.

I served aboard LST 1171 in the mid '60s. We were the last class of LST with the bow doors. We were about 100' longer than the 325 but still had that flat bottom. As he describes in the video, the ship flexed while sailing through the waves. You could stand up by the bow and get that feeling like riding an elevator as the ship flexed. They rode pretty rough due to the flat bottom and did the rock and roll pretty good. We carried 325 Marines a well as the various armed vehicles, trucks. etc.

My Dad served on LST 958, an LST 542-class ship, in the Pacific in WWII. LST 325 was an earlier (original) class LST and was a bit more austere than the later, 542 class, ships. We built over 1,000 LSTs in WWII - many were built at the "inland" shipyards like Evanston, IL, or Pittsburgh. My Dad's was built in Hingham, MA, by Bethelem Steel. They were versatile ships, nicknamed "Long Slow Targets," essential to moving lots of materiel onto the beaches. My Dad's LST got campaign credit for landing at Okinawa and also visited Pelileu, Eniwetok, and Leyte. The picture is at Gunta Bay, Okinawa.

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It took us about 90 minutes of browsing to get through it all.

And the volunteers were as nice as nice could be.

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I just enjoyed watching this Bendable, thanks for posting it.

It would have been great to see those giant doors opening

Excellent video!

Thank you for posting!!

Their trans-Atlantic crossings must have been unpleasant given the flat-bottom design of the hull.

Amen to the seamen that sailed them.

Thank you for posting this, very interesting!

My father served on a LST in the Pacific Theater, then spent time post war decommissioning them in California.

Thanks for posting. I toured the USS Alabama which sits in Mobile Bay and the Lexington when it was moored in Pensacola. The size of the Alabama was impressive.

My father in law was LST 765 from launch September 1944 to December 1945.



Found this cartoon after he died would like to hear the story behind it.

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As much as combatants get the headlines, amphibious ships I find to be much more interesting.

I spent a little time aboard USS Harlan County-LST 1196 in 1986. While in the 101st Airborne, our company attended something they called Naval Amphibious Warfare School at JOINT EXPEDITIONARY BASE LITTLE CREEK Virginia. Sounded fancy but it was just how to attack beachheads like Marines using landing crafts. We deployed from inside, rolling out of the bay through open doors and by loading in and out using cargo nets. This was the end of March and cold and rainy. We also practice attaching beaches like Marines. Interesting course but I can tell you I’ll never forget trying to sleep in the Marine quarters that was rows and rows of 4 skinny hammocks high and very little space between the rows. When someone layer in their hammock their back was literally in your face. There was probably 2-3” but it felt like 1”. The heads were pretty small. I remember seeing the sailors in formation next to our formations in the landing craft/tank bay and amazed how fat they were compared to us and how their uniforms were so disheveled. First ship I’d been about in my life. The chow wasn’t bad. Beat the hell out of MRE’s.

Very cool. I would like to take a tour also. My Experience like 10X-Shooter is on the "newer" versions. USS Spartanburg County three-month cruise during a NATO training exercise. During my time with 26th MEU (SOC) aka Marine Expeditionary Unit Special Operations Capable, we had two LST's with us. They carried the causeways for beach head operations, also vehicles and Marines.

Lock N Load

Michael
USMC Ret