Cuban Missile Crisis erupted. Sandoval moved to Morehead City, North Carolina; embarked marines; and steamed south to stand by in case of need. At the end of November, as international tension eased, she returned to Norfolk where she remained into the new year, 1963. She then resumed local exercises, transportation operations, and training exercises along the eastern seaboard and in the Caribbean. With the end of summer, she prepared for her first deployment with the U.S. 6th Fleet; and, on 21 September, she departed Morehead City. She operated in the Mediterranean for five months; returned to Norfolk in February; resumed duty with Amphibious Squadron 10 (PhibRon 10); and, in the fall, headed back across the Atlantic Ocean to the coast of Spain where she participated in Operation Steel Pike, the largest landing exercise in the Atlantic since World War II. Effective 14 August 1964, the ship was redesignated LPA-194. During the next several years, Sandoval rotated between duty with PHIBRON 10 in the western Atlantic and operations in the Mediterranean as a unit of PhibRon 6. She stood by on alert with the 6th Fleet during the 1967 Arab-Israeli war, and turned to scientific tasks the following year. During February 1968, she assisted test and evaluation forces off Florida; and, in December, she operated some west of the Canary Islands as a unit of the Manned Spacecraft Recovery Force for Apollo 8. With 1969, she resumed training exercises; and, on 19 March, she sailed east for her last deployment with the 6th Fleet. Well into the summer, she participated in fleet, bi-national, and NATO exercises; and, on 5 August, she got underway for Morehead City and Norfolk, Virginia. She arrived at Norfolk on the 19th and, a week later, received orders to prepare for inactivation. Final decommissioning and fate On 3 March 1970, Sandoval was decommissioned and turned over to the Inactive Ship Maintenance Facility, Norfolk. On 20 August 1970, she was transferred to the custody of the Maritime Administration and laid up with the James River, Virginia, Group, National Defense Reserve Fleet, where she remained into July 1974. On 1 December 1976, she was struck from the Navy list, and was disposed of by the MARAD on 1 August 1983. She was sold Isaac Varela Davalillo, for scrapping in Spain. Dedication of USS Sandoval to The Sandoval Family The dedication of the USS Sandoval was in 1944 to Eliza