This deck could host a collegiate basketball game. #Fact
The USS Carl Vinson once held the body of al-Qaida leader Osama Bin Laden. It appears that on Veterans Day it will hold Roy Williams, Tom Izzo, their respective teams, cheerleaders, and camera crews for a college basketball game.
Representatives from the Morale Entertainment Foundation, ESPN, vendors, and the Navy will be making a visit to the ship next week for a walkthrough. Speaking to the Associated Press, Mike Whalen of the MEF said:
“Now that the Carl Vinson is back safe and sound and America is now well-aware of the important mission that was tasked to the Carl Vinson, we find it to be a source of pride that this ship will make history twice in 2011.”
Further details given in the article were:
Until now, the best organizers could say was that the game would be played on either the Carl Vinson or the Ronald Reagan. After meeting with Navy officials in Washington, D.C., this week, Whalen said there’s a 99 percent chance the game will be on the Carl Vinson.
A court and stadium seating for about 7,000 fans will be set up on the flight deck. In case of rain, the game will be moved below to the hangar deck, with bleacher seating for the fans.
One can only hope that whatever details need to be worked out for this to happen are resolved with little resistance. We all will remember where we were that Sunday night when President Obama took the podium at the White House to tell us the news that the United States had the body of Osama Bin Laden in it’s possession and he was in fact dead. I’m sure all basketball fans, players/coaches, and everyone involved in putting this together will remember where they were on Veterans Day 2011 when a college basketball game was played on the ship that laid the al-Qaida leader’s body to rest.
On a scale of 1-10 on the Patriotic Meter this has to rank about a 1,000,000,000.
