Wichita-class replenishment oiler

Wichita-class replenishment oilers comprised a class of seven replenishment oilers used by the United States Navy from the late 1960s to the mid-1990s. During this time the ships were commissioned naval auxiliaries with the hull classification AOR. The ships were designed for rapid underway replenishment using both connected replenishment and vertical replenishment. The ships could carry 160,000 barrels of petroleum fuel, 600 tons of munitions, 200 tons of dry stores and 100 tons of refrigerated stores. The original concept was that the AORs would serve the same function for the anti-submarine carrier (CVS) groups that the larger, faster Sacramento-class AOEs did for the attack carrier (CVA) groups.

With the reduction in the U.S. Navy fleet, these ships were all decommissioned and stricken from the Naval Vessel Register (NVR) in the 1990s.

Ships
Traditionally Navy oilers have been named for rivers; the Wichita class were named for city/river pairs with Native American names.