Naval History Forums

Under normal circunstances this ship would still be around for another 10 years. I guess that this is what usually happens to a country with 6 million unemployed suffering an economic crisis.

Príncipe de Asturias, the first aircraft carrier of the Spanish Navy, was decommissioned yesterday at Rota Naval base and will be disarmed and sold for scrap in Ferrol.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_ai ... e_Asturias

Jose, i'm afraid she was not the first Spanish carrier.

Dedalo served with your navy from 1972 - 1989.
Spain was somewhat late in true fixed wing carrier aviation,
and the ex USS Cabot obviously filled a need in a rather archaic fashion.

Dedalo was replaced with the very ship whose demise you mention.

I should have said: "the first aircraft carrier of the Spanish Navy built in Spain".

After WW2 the sunk Italian treaty cruiser R.N. Trieste was raised, righted and towed to Spain.
The plan was to convert her to a 'carrier'.
Needless to say this shortsighted plan went nowhere and the ex Trieste was subsequently scrapped in the mid 1950's.
Does anyone have details on this scheme.

The hull of the Trieste was towed to Ferrol where it was drydocked and inspected by group of technicians.
However, the idea to convert the old hull into a carrier was soon discarded because of the enormous cost and the lack of experience in the construction of this type of ships.
The hull remained in Ferrol until 1956 when it was scrapped.