Discover The History Of US Navy Ships Named After Michigan Cities – Including the new USNS Lansing
The US Navy has a long history of naming ships in its feet for states and other geographic names. There are now 4 ships named after cities in Michigan with a recent naming of the USNS Lansing. The vessel is being constructed now a shipyard in Mobile, Alabama.
When constructed, the ship will be an Expedited Fast Transport ship, a class of vessel that is used when moving materiel quickly between larger ships that can not move as swiftly.
The Secretary of the Navy notes that in the history of Navy there have been 32 ships named after some aspect of Michigan. Three other cities have been given the naval treatment, Detroit, Flint and Grand Rapids.
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6 different vessels have been named for Detroit. The first was a British ship won in the War of 1812 to a combat ship that was decommissioned in 2023.
The USS Flint was a cruiser that saw action in the Pacific theatre of World War 2.
There have been two ships named for Grand Rapids. The first USS Grand Rapids was, like the Flint also in service during WWII, however it was stationed in the Caribbean and was used as a weather ship. The second Grand Rapids saw service during the 1970s with home ports in San Diego and Naples, Italy.
There was a prior naval vessel named Lansing, however it was named in honor of a sailor with that surname rather than the Michigan capital. There have been two ficticitional USS Lansings, the first in a
2001 made-for-TV movie Danger Beneath the Sea. SSN-975, Lansing a Virginia class submarine, appears in the direct to video film Solar Attack.
Editor's Note: The ship shown above is the USNS Guam, a similar ship to the yet-to-be-built USNS Lansing.