The former USS Sanctuary (AH 17), the last of the US Navy’s Haven class hospital ships, is being broken up for scrap at the Esco yard in Brownsville Texas following a long-distance tow from her final lay-up berth at Baltimore, Maryland.
The 15,226gt ship had been laid down by Sun Shipbuilding and Dry Dock Co, Chester, Pennsylvania in 1944 as the C4 class Marine Owl, but was renamed Sanctuary upon delivery and immediately converted into a hospital ship by the Todd Shipbuilding Co yard at Hoboken, New Jersey in 1945.
Although completed too late for World War II, the ship saw limited post-war duty in Japan and was reactivated for service off Vietnam in the 1960s. In 2007 the vessel was sold at public auction for $50,000 to Potomac Navigation who had planned to use her as a floating hotel or storage facility.
