The USS Fortify (AM-446/MSO-446) was an Agile-class minesweeper launched in 1953 and commissioned in 1954. She became the flagship of Mine Division 92, and her task was to remove contact, magnetic, and acoustic mines placed in the water. The ship was reclassified MSO-446 in 1955 and sailed for the first tour of duty in the Far East, participating in fleet operations in Japanese waters. After her minesweeping gear was removed, an electronic countermeasures tool was installed on the fantail, and she was deployed in the Tonkin Gulf, where she monitored and intercepted Viet Cong radio transmissions on suspected furnishing of arms and ammunition by South Vietnamese gunboats and fulfilled coastal surveillance duty through the end of the war. The vessel embarked on a WestPac deployment in 1971 for coastal patrol off South Vietnam. She was later assigned to participate in Operation End Sweep after the war, removing mines laid by the U.S. in North Vietnam and other waterways. The USS Fortify was decommissioned in 1992, struck from the Navy list in 1994, and sold for scrapping in 2000. Because asbestos was widely used in the Navy, veterans risked routine asbestos exposure and potentially developing severe illnesses stemming from it decades later.
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