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NavSource Online: Mine Warfare Vessel Photo Archive

Contributed by Mike Smolinski

Excel (MSO 439)
ex-AM-439



Call sign:
November - Lima - Papa - Alpha
Aggressive Class Minesweeper: Laid down 9 February 1953 as AM-439 at the Higgins Corp., New Orleans, LA; Launched, 25 September 1953; Reclassified as an Ocean Minesweeper (non-magnetic), MSO-439, 7 February 1955; Commissioned USS Excel (MSO-439), 24 February 1955; Decommissioned, 30 September 1992; Struck from the Navy Register 28 March 1994; Laid up in the Reserve Fleet; Sold for scrap to Crowley Marine in January 2000.

Specifications: Displacement 775 t; Length 172'; Beam 35'; Draft 12'; Speed 14 kts; Complement 8 Officers, 70 Enlisted; Armament, as built, one single 40mm gun mount, two .50 cal. machine guns, final configuration, bow gun removed, two .50 cal. machine guns remain; Propulsion, four Packard ID1700 diesel engines, replaced by four Waukasha Motors Co. diesels, two shafts, two controllable pitch propellers.

Click on thumbnail
for full size image		 Size Image Description Source
Excel 186k . 102 Minesweeper
Web Site
Dick Lewis
Excel 140k . David Buell
Excel 1270k c. 1956
Departing Long Beach
U.S. Navy photo		 Robert M. Cieri
Excel 370k c. September 1979
Naval Station Treasure Island, with the San Francisco-Oakland Bay bridge in the background		 Robert M. Cieri
Excel 146k c. September 1979
Naval Station Treasure Island		 Robert M. Cieri
Excel 146k c. July 1980
Naval Air Station Alameda, CA
Moored forward of Gallant (MSO 489)		 Robert M. Cieri
Excel 146k U.S. Navy photo from the February 1983 edition of All Hands magazine. Joe Radigan
View the Excel (MSO-439)
DANFS History entry located on the Haze Gray & Underway Web Site.
Crew Contact And Reunion Information
Navy MSO Association Email Addresses
Additional Resources and Web Sites of Interest
102 Minesweepers (MSO) Oceangoing Minesweepers
Naval Minewarfare Association
Association of Minemen
Navy MSO Association
Back To The Main Photo Index Back To the Mine Warfare Ship Photo Index Back to the Ocean Minesweeper (MSO) Photo Index
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