Corpus Christi Texas
USS Lexington
Saw a lot of hot action in 4 major WW2 battles, suffering many dead.
Many spirits are still on duty; sometimes helping and interacting.
DESCRIPTION
The USS Lexington CV-16 is an Essex Class World War 2 aircraft carrier, that after many years of service, is now a fantastic memorial aircraft carrier museum, that is well worth the price of admission. Once the visitor makes it to the Corpus Christi waterfront at Corpus Christi Bay, it can’t be missed. It is a gigantic, beautiful ship! The Length of the Flight Deck is 910 ft. Length at the water line is 880 feet. The height from the water line to Flight Deck is 52 feet. The maximum width is 196 feet. The draft, Keel to Water Line is 30 feet. It displaces 42,000 tons, and it’s average speed was 30+ knots. RANGE at maximum speed was 4,131 miles.
Tom and I visited The USS Lexington CV-16 during our 2006 road trip. We enjoyed a self-directed 2 hour tour of the entire ship, including the exhibits, and lost our eye balls at all the wonderful aircraft sitting up on the Flight Deck. The flight simulator found on the first floor deck hanger was a lot of fun!
We wandered all over the ship, going up and down stairs meant for skinnier and younger folks, but doable with having a sense of adventure. Air craft carriers, no matter the year, are like a small city, offering everything needed for living and working aboard. We toured the quarters for enlisted men and women and officers, saw where they ate, slept, bought supplies, went for medical help and recreation. We also saw where they worked during a mission, tour of duty, or peace time duties. While serving on this air craft carrier, seamen usually stayed in their areas, not venturing into places where they didn’t belong.
Now that the ship is a memorial museum, people who served on board can explore the ship like everyone else!
Groups like the Boy Scouts and Cadets, as well as paranormal investigation groups have spent the night on the ship.
There are many USS Lexington CV-16 ship tours on YouTube.
This one is in real time, but it has lots of information and is very thorough.
Another tour, shorter and very interesting, can be found here.
HISTORY
THE USS Lexington CV-16 , also called “Lady Lex”, was built in the Massachusetts’ Fore River Shipyard, originally to be named The USS Cabot. But when the USS Lexington was sunk in the Coral Sea, this aircraft carrier was given the name, The USS Lexington CV-16; becoming the fifth US Navy ship to be named Lexington, in honor of the Revolutionary War Battle of Lexington.
After being commissioned in 1943, and going through some training maneuvers, and then getting more practice in a “shakedown cruise”, The USS Lexington CV-16 sped off to Pearl Harbor to join the Central Pacific Fleet, and participated in 21 months of combat, and fought effectively in nearly every battle with the Japanese during the 1943-1945 war effort.
“Her planes destroyed 372 enemy aircraft in the air, and 475 more on the ground. She sank or destroyed 300,000 tons of enemy cargo and damaged an additional 600,000 tons. The ship’s guns shot down 15 planes and assisted in downing five more.”
Being in so much hot action, The USS Lexington CV16 took its share of hits and dings, and casualties, but always returned with a vengeance, despite efforts of the Japanese to sink her. Tokyo Rose, the radio voice of Japanese propaganda, gave the ship a nick-name, “The Blue Ghost,” because the Japanese military had claimed that they had sunk her – in four instances; the much hoped for result of their four major attacks on the ship. The USS Lexington CV16 earned eleven battle stars and a commendation from President Roosevelt.
After briefly being decommissioned from 1947-1952, The USS Lexington CV-16 was reactivated and sent to San Diego, California to participate in the 7th Fleet operations. Though she wasn’t a direct participant in the action, LEXINGTON CV-16 made her presence known, like a hulking pit bull, sitting in the corner, by keeping an “offshore vigil during tensions in Formosa, Laos, and Cuba.”
From 1962-1990, The USS Lexington CV-16 was stationed at Pensacola, Florida, as a Naval Training aircraft carrier, upgraded to be a CVT-16 carrier. In 1990, after having the longest career of any aircraft carrier, The USS Lexington was finally decommissioned for the last time, and was given to the care of the City of Corpus Christi to be used as a museum/memorial ship.
HISTORY OF MANIFESTATIONS
When people are suddenly killed in battle, and are whipped out of their bodies, their spirits are sometimes not ready to leave this world just yet, and they stay in a place that is comfortable and familiar, perhaps to continue on what they were doing before their sudden death.
The USS Lexington CV-16 endured four major attacks, two of which are listed below.
In 1943, soon after the USS Lexington CV-16 reported for duty with the Central Pacific Fleet, the ship was torpedoed by a Japanese sub, killing some men on board.
On Nov. 5th, 1944, The USS Lexington CV-16 suffered a costly Japanese kamikaze attack during a sea battle, when the Japanese plane hit the engine room/ back of the bridge area.
Others were killed by the bullets of attacking planes, etc.
When people die violently, or in an unpleasant manner, they sometimes relive the time beforehand, experiencing what they felt and thought before they died.
Fifty USS Lexington seamen burned to death, if they weren’t immediately incinerated inside the ship when the plane crashed into the back of the bridge and engine room.
There were two other major attacks on the ship, and people died in those as well.
While 370 men died aboard The USS Lexington CV-16, not all were war casualties. Some deaths were caused by accidents and illnesses. Sometimes if an entity had died from an accident caused by his or her own lack of attention, the entity is very angry at himself or herself, and won’t cross over, choosing to stew emotionally in this world.
A Chief Petty Officer on board The USS Lexington C16 backed up inadvertently into a propeller.
Sometimes when high energy is generated by people and events, this energy is consumed by the stationary structure that surrounds it. It is known as residual energy, that plays in a loop, until it is used up. The living hear and see things and people from the past, but no intelligent connection can be made to it.
Some of the energy from all the battle action has been sucked up into the structure of the ship.
MANIFESTATIONS
There are many spirits still on duty on The USS Lexington CV-16. They have manifested all over the ship in a variety of ways. Hundreds of personal experiences have been reported.
Signs of Unseen Presences
Many sensitive people have felt sick in certain areas of the USS Lexington, like the Switch Room.
Apparently, spirits like to help. When painters took a short break, imagine their surprise upon returning to their job, to see that their rather large project was completely painted for them.
An acting deputy director of the museum has experienced an often-reported occurrence several times. As he came out of his office, he has heard the movement of clothing and the sound of footsteps behind him. When he turns around to say “Hi,” no one is there.
Spirits of a Japanese Pilot & an American Seaman
It seems that the Japanese pilot who caused all the mayhem and death is still on board as well, as well as someone who died because of the attack.
Two staff members saw these two entities standing together for a moment in the hallway.
Enemies while alive, but friends now?
Spirit of an Engine Room Operator
An engine room operator who died during the Japanese plane attack.
He is described as being good-natured, incredibly handsome, “buff,” with short blond hair, and piercing blue eyes.
He calls himself “Charlie.”
Charlie is especially seen on the anniversary of his death.
Charlie Amuses Himself
Charlie has been seen working in this area, looking intently at an engine, like he was trying to fix it.
Charlie gets his chuckles by appearing to visitors when they tour through. He likes to appear in front of pretty young women.
When a bunch of cadets spent the night on board, some ran around the ship on a dare, and ran right into him in the engine room.
Charlie Helps
Once Charlie appeared very life-like, dressed in his uniform, introduced himself as “Charlie,” to a family, and asked if they would like a tour.
When they lost him below deck, they went to ask about him, and were told that there are no guided tours, and this fellow had died in WW2.
Charlie likes to turn off lights and shut doors. Perhaps, he is concerned about the electric and heating bill.
Entity of the Chief Petty Officer
He has been seen a lot, dressed in his uniform, scowling at the living, still mad at himself for backing into a moving propeller.
A mannequin dressed in a uniform has been placed where he usually appears. Now he appears beside it!
Residual Hauntings
Many individuals claim that they hear voices, screams, and even cries of men and women in distress and pain, coming from the Engine Room area that was hit by the Japanese plane. Many died of their burns.
Visitors and staff claim to have heard the sound similar to distant guns being fired as in a battle.
During a lightning storm, a witness heard men screaming, and saw a misty view of the entities of several men running across the deck area.
It is interesting though that this vision needed the energy from the electrical storm to appear.
Entity of a Seaman
He has been seen on deck, attached to whatever he did there, or perhaps because he died in this area.
After a staffer had mopped the forward part of the weather deck, known as the foc’sle, he had gone to the other end of the deck to get some coffee. When he returned, he saw a pair of single foot prints in the middle of his freshly mopped deck, but no foot prints leading into or out of the wet floor.
STILL HAUNTED?
A big YES INDEED is in order. Some of the 370 people killed on board haven’t left just yet, and amuse themselves by keeping the living company and helping when they can do so. They are a friendly group of entities, perhaps working through their deaths and/or suffering at the same time, with the exception of the perpetually crabby Chief Petty Officer, still angry at himself for causing his own death.
Hundreds of personal experiences have been reported by staff and visitors over the years that this air craft carrier has been docked at Corpus Christi. Many have also been reported by a paranormal investigators.
A lot of hard evidence has also been captured by many groups. Here are a few examples.
San Antonio Ghost Hunters investigated The USS Lexington CV-16 three times and captured some great evidence. The most interesting EVP they caught was the first and last name of a seaman, “Kenneth King.”
An episode of Ghost Lab with Brad and Barry Klieng investigates The USS Lexington CV-16. They caught a lot of evidence. One EVP: “I’m burning inside the Lexington.” They also got the last name of a seaman, “Dawson.”
Ghost investigators Brad and Barry Klieng of the former Ghost Lab TV Show, together with Paul Coffey, recently captured a full seaman in uniform going into the wall.
The TAPS – GHOST HUNTERS TV SHOW also investigated The USS Lexington CV-16 and weren’t disappointed in their findings.
LOCATION
USS Lexington CV-16
2914 North Shoreline Boulevard
Corpus Christi, Texas 78402
(361) 888-4873
The USS Lexington CV-16 can be found permanently docked in Corpus Christi Bay, just across the ship channel from downtown Corpus Christi, Texas.
SOURCES INCLUDE
- The Ghost Hunter’s Field Guide
by Rich Newman
Llewellyn Publications
2011 - USS Lexington website * USS Lexington Wiki
- USS Lexington website – “About the USS Lexington” * USS Lexington website – “Tour Exhibits (2)”
- USS Lexington website – “Visitor Center” * USS Lexington website – “Programs”
- “About the Lexington Ghost” by Diane Richbourg for the Corpus Christi Caller-Times
- Haunted Places to Go.com – “Haunted Ships”
- Scary For Kids.com – “USS Lexington”
- San Antonio Ghost Hunters YouTube Video of the USS Lexington
- Klieng Brothers, Paul Coffey – YouTube Video of the USS Lexington
- USS: Lexington: Russell Rush Haunted Tour
Our Haunted Paranormal Stories are Written by Julie Carr
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