USS O'Bannon (DD-987)

USS O'Bannon (DD-987), a Spruance-class destroyer, was the third ship of the United States Navy to be named for Lieutenant Presley O'Bannon (1776–1850), an early hero of the US Marine Corps.

O'Bannon was laid down on 21 February 1977 by the Ingalls Shipbuilding, Pascagoula, Miss.; launched on 25 September 1978; and commissioned on 15 December 1979, Commander Marshall R. Willenbucher in command.

Homeport
Assigned to Homeport in Charleston South Carolina when the Congressional BRAC (Base Realignment and Closure) committee decided to close down that shipyard, the USS O'BANNON (DD-987) was re-Homeported to Mayport Florida.

Deployments and Ports of Call
UNITAS XXXII: Cartagena Columbia, Rodmin Panama, Manta Ecuador, Lima Peru, Valparaíso Chile, Talcahuano Chile, Argentina, Rio de Janeiro Brazil, Puerta la Cruz Venezuela

Baltops '92: Eidenborough Scotland, Kiel Germany, Karlskrona Sweden, Denmark, Norway, Severnmorsk Russia

MEF 3-95 (started 15 July 1995) Lajes, Azores (24JUL95), Palma, Spain (28-30JUL95 ), Rota, Spain, Kos, Greece (3-5AUG95 ), Dubai United Arab Emirates (5-7SEP95 ), ASU Bahrain (18-23SEP, 10-14OCT, 21-22OCT95 ), Muscat,Oman 30OCT-01NOV95 ), Dubai, UAE 3-8NOV95), Media, Portugal.

In 1995 the ship was assigned to Destroyer Squadron 14.

UNITAS XL-99: Cartagena Columbia. Rodmin, Panama Manta, Ecuador Lima Peru, Valparaíso Chile, Viña del Mar Chile, Coquimbo Chile, Argentina, Rio de Janeiro Brazil, Puerta la Cruz Venezuela

Fate
Originally scheduled to remain in service through 2010, decommissioning of the Spruance-class destroyers was accelerated as a cost-saving measure, and by June 2005 O'Bannon was the last Spruance destroyer in service in the Atlantic Fleet.

O'Bannon was decommissioned on 19 August 2005 and struck from the Naval Vessel Register the same day. In 2004 O'Bannon was to be sold to Chile, but in 2005 she was scheduled to be transferred via FMS to the Turkish Navy. In the end she was sunk off the coast of Virginia at 3:23pm on 6 October 2008 in a training exercise by the USS Dwight D. Eisenhower (CVN-69) carrier group, using missiles, guns and finally a Mk 82 bomb.