Acadia completed her outfitting at her builder's yard on 6 July and then made the brief trip to Naval Station San Diego.

On 4 January 1983, the destroyer tender put to sea for a journey to the Orient, the Indian Ocean and the east coast of Africa.

The ship entered Subic Bay, Luzon on 27 February and performed repairs until 3 March when she put to sea for duty in the Indian Ocean.

The destroyer tender returned to the base at Diego Garcia on 29 April and spent the next month there repairing warships on duty in the troubled waters of the Arabian Sea and the Persian Gulf.

In fact, the ship did not get underway again until late in March 1984 when she put to sea for three days in the southern California operating area.

Holiday leave and upkeep occupied the last half of December 1985, but Acadia launched into a full schedule of repair services in January 1986.

Acadia arrived at the Naval Air Station, Alameda, on 1 October and began a busy six weeks of repair work there.

The destroyer tender returned to San Diego in the middle of November and spent the remainder of 1986 in preparations for overseas movement.

Although originally slated to deploy in January 1987, Acadia provided repair services to ships in the San Diego area into the spring.

Between 1 and 27 June, Acadia provided berthing, messing, and repair services to Stark, "doing what she [Acadia] was designed to do, providing forward deployed support and battle damage repair..." On 5 September 1990 the ship departed San Diego for the Persian Gulf during Operation Desert Shield and Operation Desert Storm.

She was responsible for the first reload of shipboard Tomahawk missiles outside the continental United States while pierside in Mina Jebel Ali.

The final 22 either became pregnant with a fellow crewmember, despite a prohibition on sexual relationships while deployed, or while on shore leave when the ship stopped in Hawaii, the Philippines, Singapore, and Thailand.

[6] On 30 October 1990, the amphibious assault ship USS Iwo Jima (LPH-2) sustained a catastrophic mechanical failure when a high-pressure steam valve burst.

Acadia returned to San Diego at the end of her deployment and received the Navy Unit Commendation for her service during the Gulf War.

In the summer of 1993, Acadia conducted sea trials which earned her two Battle Es for warship preparedness prior to her pending deployment to the Western Pacific and Persian Gulf.

She encountered Typhoon Kyle in the South China Sea before she called briefly at Singapore for mail and personnel exchange.

Upon arrival, a seaman from the Boats and Cranes Division of the Deck Department was knocked overboard while lowering the ship's stairwell.

Her final voyage home involved calls at Hong Kong; Sasebo and Yokosuka, Japan; Guam; and Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, before arriving a San Diego in mid-April 1994.

[7][full citation needed] On 16 December 1994, Acadia was decommissioned and laid up at the Naval Inactive Ship Maintenance Facility (NISMF), Pearl Harbor, Hawaii.