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USS Oriskany becomes great carrier reef

More than 500 pounds of plastic explosives go off on the USS Oriskany.

• USS Oriskany facts

IN THE GULF OF MEXICO (AP) -- It took the U.S. Navy to do what two wars, hurricanes and a salvage contractor couldn't: sink the famed aircraft carrier known as "The Mighty O."

More than 500 pounds of plastic explosives, going off with flashes of light and clouds of brown and gray smoke, sent the USS Oriskany into its new life as the world's largest intentionally created artificial reef. Hundreds of people watching in boats had to stay a mile away but could still smell the acrid smoke.

The aircraft carrier went down stern first, the bow lifting up. The rest of the ship went under in a giant spray of water, the blue ocean churning foamy white as the deck -- bright orange with rust -- slid under.

Boat horns blews in tribute, and veterans saluted as the big ship many of them called home during Korea and Vietnam disappeared. Some cried.

"I guess there was a little tear in my eye because a good part of my life went down with her, but it was a fitting end for a good ship," said Jack Witter, 72, of Fort Pierce, who served as an aviation ordnance operator on the Oriskany during the Korean War.

The Navy rescued the ship from the salvage yard after a contract to turn it into scrap metal fell through. The sinking made the Oriskany its first ship to be used in a pilot program to reef old warships.

"I hoped it will be in a museum someplace, but this is kind of unique," said Sen. John McCain, R-Arizonia, a former Navy pilot who had taken off from the Oriskany before he was shot down in Vietnam in 1967 and held as a prisoner of war for five years. (Watch McCain talk about the carrier from which he flew -- 4:04)

"It will provide a lot of recreation and a lot of good times for people, so, you know, as long as people like me are alive, the memory of the ship will be alive," McCain told CNN.

The Oriskany, known by former crew members as the "Mighty O," was commissioned in 1950 and named after an American Revolutionary War battle. It was also among the ships used by President Kennedy in a show of force during the 1962 Cuban missile crisis. It was decommissioned in 1976.

Pensacola leaders hope the Oriskany, now 24 miles off Pensacola Beach and 212 feet underwater, will become a prime destination for sport divers and fishermen and provide an economic boost to the area, which has been hard hit by recent hurricanes. The site could open to recreational divers as soon as Friday; Navy divers must check it for safety hazards first.

Other Navy ships have been turned into reefs, including the USS Spiegel Grove, a retired cargo vessel that was scuttled in 2002 off Key Largo. But that was a civilian project, paid for with a combination of county and private money.

Hours before the sinking, a flotilla of more than 300 boats with hundreds of Oriskany veterans cruised nearby. Some shouted questions about when they served aboard the ship.

Hurricanes and environmental permitting problems had delayed the $20 million project two years, but the sinking itself was much quicker than expected: 37 minutes instead of more than four hours.

"It was one heck of a blast. I didn't think it would light up like that," said Oriskany veteran Nick Eris, 68, of Perdido Key, who served on the ship as an aviation electrician in 1960.

Lloyd Quiter, 58, who served four tours in Vietnam aboard the aircraft carrier, played "Attention All Hands" on his boatswain's pipe as the ship plunged into the Gulf of Mexico, then wiped tears from his eyes.

"I'm a little stunned, it's a little hard to take," he said Quiter, of North Collins, New York.