On August 15, the US Navy tested a variety of weapons on a decommissioned frigate, using air and sea tactical weapons to absolutely annihilate the ship. Now, the Navy has released footage of the sinking exercise, giving us a glimpse at the destructive power torpedoes and missiles have.
The ship in question was the USS Ingraham, an Oliver Hazard Perry-class guided-missile frigate, which was commissioned on August 5, 1989. Ingraham was decommissioned on January 30, 2015, and held at a shipyard to await its fate.
In an explosive send-off, the Navy organized a Sinking Exercise (SINKEX) in the Hawaiian Islands Operating Area as part of a Large Scale Exercise. Showing no mercy for the frigate, the USS Carl Vinson (a Nimitz-class supercarrier) launched Super Hornet aircraft to attack the frigate with glide bombs, F-35C fighters used laser-guided weapons, patrol aircraft tested the Harpoon weapon system, before an attack submarine dealt the final blow with two advanced torpedoes. As you can see in the video, the weapons were rather effective.
SINKEX operations are carefully planned to do as minimal damage to the environment as possible, with all hazardous materials removed before the ship is sunk. The ship should sink rapidly to the ocean floor, which is at least 50 nautical miles from land and 1.8 km (6,000 feet) deep.
