USS Lexington (CV-16)
_underway_on_20_February_1944.jpg) The USS Lexington on February 20, 1944 |
|
| Overview | |
|---|---|
| Shipyard | |
| Order | 1940 |
| Keel laying | July 15, 1941 |
| Launch | September 23, 1942 |
| 1. Period of service |
|
| period of service |
Feb. 17, 1943 April 23, 1947 |
| Whereabouts | Museum ship |
| Technical specifications | |
| Data at the time of commissioning | |
| displacement |
27,100 ts |
| length |
265.8 m |
| width |
45 m |
| Draft |
8.8 m |
| crew |
2,600 men |
| drive |
8 boilers, 4 turbines, 4 screws, 150,000 hp |
| speed |
33 knots |
| Range |
16,900 nm at 15 kn |
| Armament |
|
| Planes |
80-100 |
| Nickname |
The Blue Ghost ( Engl. "The Blue Ghost") |
The USS Lexington (CV-16) (later CVA-16 , CVS-16 , CVT 16 and AVT-16 ) is an aircraft carrier of the Essex class and stood from 1943 to 1991 in the service of the United States Navy .
history
Construction and commissioning
The new CV-16 was on 15 July 1941 the Group for Bethlehem Steel belonging Fore River Shipyard placed in Quincy (Massachusetts) to Kiel and should in the name of Cabot are baptized. On June 16, 1942 it was decided to rename CV-16 again with the name Lexington in honor of the USS Lexington (CV-2) , which sank in the Coral Sea on May 8, 1942 . The CV-16 became the fifth ship of the US Navy with this name. The name Cabot went to CVL-28 , a light aircraft carrier of the Independence class .
After being launched on September 23, 1942 and being fitted out in the Boston docks , the carrier was commissioned in February 1943. Her first voyage took her through the Panama Canal into the Pacific to Pearl Harbor , where she arrived on August 9, 1943.
Use in the Pacific War
1943
The Lexington made its first combat mission in September 1943 during the Battle of the Gilbert Islands and in October during the attack on Wake . She then returned to Pearl Harbor to rearm. From November 19 to 24, 1943, Lexington took part in ventures to establish bases on the Gilbert Islands and to smash Japanese forces in the Marshall Islands . Her planes shot down 29 Japanese planes on November 23 and 24.
In the morning attacks of December 4, 1943 on the Kwajalein Atoll , their units destroyed a cargo ship, 30 enemy planes and damaged two cruisers . Two torpedo planes attacked around noon, but they were shot down by the on-board artillery. At around 7:20 p.m., the guns were back in action as a large-scale Japanese air raid began. At 11:22 p.m., flare parachutes lit the sky around the Lexington and ten minutes later she was hit by a torpedo on the starboard side and damaged the steering gear . After the control had been converted to manual operation, the Lexington returned to Pearl Harbor on December 9 for further repairs. She then reached Bremerton , Washington , on December 22 , 1944, where she stayed in the shipyard until February 20, 1944 .
1944
Fully operational again, the Lexington then drove via Almeda , California and Pearl Harbor to the Majuro Atoll . In March 1944, the carrier was back in the combat zone and took part in the fighting in the Central Pacific and in the reconquest of New Guinea over the next few months . After an opening battle at Mille, the Task Force carried out 58 operations against centers of Japanese resistance outside Japan and supported the landing on Hollandia on April 13, 1944. On April 28, 1944, the Lexington took part in the air raids on the supposedly unassailable Truk Islands, with its planes shooting down 17 enemy planes. Despite heavy counter-attacks, the carrier was not damaged, but this did not prevent the Japanese propaganda from announcing for the second time after Kwajalein that the Lexington had been sunk.
In a surprise attack on Saipan on June 11th, the TF 58 won the air sovereignty over the island, which was then bombed by the aircraft during the Battle of Saipan . On June 16, 1944, the Lexington emerged again undamaged from a battle with Japanese torpedo planes stationed on Guam , which in turn did not prevent the Japanese from reporting them as sunk for the third time.
,_June_1944,_Philippine_Sea.jpg)
During the Mariana operation on June 19-20, the Japanese resistance provoked the battle in the Philippine Sea , with the Lexington mainly contributing to the TF 58's great victory. After more than 300 enemy aircraft were destroyed and an aircraft carrier, a tanker and a destroyer sank during the two days of the battle, Japanese naval aviation no longer played a role during the further course of the war. The Eniwetok taking advantage Atoll as a basis, the aircraft flew Lexington missions over Guam and in August during the Battle of the Palau Islands and over the Bonin Islands.
The Lexington reached the Caroline Islands on September 6 and carried out air strikes against the islands of Yap and Ulithi for three days . This was followed by attacks on Mindanao , Visayas and the Manila area. Their task forces destroyed bases on Okinawa on October 10 and two days later on Formosa . The Lexington was once again undamaged during the Battle of Formosa .
During the safeguarding of the landing on Leyte , the Lexington aircraft made a significant contribution to the victory of the American Navy in the Battle of Leyte Gulf . While the US aircraft carriers were under constant enemy attacks, as a result of which the Princeton sank, their planes supported the sinking of the Japanese battleship Musashi on October 24, 1944 and scored hits on three cruisers.
The next day, with the assistance of Essex aircraft, the Japanese carrier Chitose and single-handedly the carrier Zuikaku were sunk. Later that day, Lexington planes helped sink a third aircraft carrier, the Zuiho . While the Japanese retreated, Lexington torpedo bombers chased the heavy cruiser Nachi and sank it with four torpedo hits on November 5th. During this operation, the Lexington was badly damaged by a kamikaze attack on its superstructure. After 20 minutes, the firestorm on deck was under control and the crew was able to resume flight operations. With its on-board guns, the Lexington was able to prevent a kamikaze attack on the carrier Ticonderoga . On November 9th, the Lexington reached the Ulithi base to repair the damage. "Radio Tokyo" claimed again that the Lexington was destroyed.
1945
After the USS Lexington became the flagship of TG 58.2 under Rear Admiral Davison on December 11, its planes attacked airfields on Luzon and Formosa during the first nine days of 1945 and encountered weak enemy resistance. The task group was transferred to the China Sea to attack enemy ships and airfields. There attacks were flown against Saipan , Cam Ranh Bay in Indochina , Hong Kong , the Pescadoren Islands and again against Formosa. The planes of TG 58.2 sank four merchant ships and four escort ships in a convoy and on January 12, 1945 destroyed another twelve ships in a convoy in Camranh Bay.
Leaving the Sea of China on January 20th, Lexington went north to attack Formosa again on January 21st and Okinawa on January 22nd. After the TG 58.2 was supplied with new weapons, it left the Ulithi base on February 10th and bombed airfields near Tokyo on February 16 and 17, 1945 in order to counteract the upcoming landing on February 19 on Iwojima ( Battle for Iwojima ) to decrease. Lexington's planes supported the attacking forces from February 19-22. On their way to the overhaul on the west coast of the United States, they attacked the main Japanese island and the southwestern island groups (the Nansei Shoto).
On May 22nd, she was ready for further missions and was transferred via Alameda and Pearl Harbor to San Pedro Bay, Leyte in the Pacific. There she joined Task Group 38.1. After a supply on July 7th and 8th, the porters attacked the Tokyo area with 1,022 aircraft on July 10; the focus was on the Japanese air bases. Later, the three combat groups headed north and on July 12 they supplied themselves eastward along Tsugaru Street; Due to the weather, the attack planned for July 13th was postponed. On July 14, 1,391 planes took off against targets in North Honshu and South Hokkaido and against ferry traffic on Tsugaru Street. On July 15th the attacks were repeated.
After the Japanese surrender was signed, the final wave of attacks dropped their bombs in the water and returned to Lexington .
After the hostilities ended, their planes patrolled Japan and dropped supplies over the prisoner-of-war camps on Honshu. She supported the occupation of Japan until she left Tokyo Bay on December 3, 1945 to take US soldiers to San Francisco during Operation Magic Carpet , where she arrived on December 16.
After the Second World War
After some operations on the west coast, the Lexington was decommissioned in Bremerton , Washington on April 23, 1947 and assigned to the reserve fleet there. On October 1, 1952, it was reclassified to the CVA-16 attack aircraft carrier. Then from September 1, 1953, the renovation and modernization in the Puget Sound Navy Yard began according to the drafts SCB-27C and SCB-125 (SCB = Ship Construction Board).
_underway_in_the_1960s.JPEG)
The Lexington was founded on August 15, 1955 under Capt. AS Heyward, Jr. put back into service. Now equipped with an angled flight deck , steam catapults and numerous other improvements to accommodate powerful aircraft. Starting in May 1956, she took part in a six-month deployment of the 7th Fleet from her new home port of San Diego .
From a base on Yokosuka , she carried out exercises, maneuvers, search and rescue missions on the coast of China and was considered the largest Far Eastern port there until her return to San Diego on December 20, 1956. There, Air Group 12 trained, who had their next mission together with the 7th Fleet.
Back in Yokosuka on June 1, 1957, the Lexington was the flagship of Rear Admiral HD Riley, commander of the 1st Carrier Division , until she returned to San Diego on October 17 . After another overhaul in Bremerton, her job as a training provider was interrupted by the Lebanon crisis . On July 14, 1958, she was ordered to San Francisco to take Air Group 21 on board and then move to Taiwan to reinforce the 7th Fleet . She reached her destination on August 7th. After this US Navy peacekeeping mission was successfully carried out, it returned to San Diego on December 19.
As the first carrier whose aircraft with air-to-surface missiles of the type -12 Bullpup AGM were armed, who left Lexington San Francisco on April 26, 1959 a further application with the 7th Fleet.
She was on standby during the Latin American Crisis from late August to September 1959 and thereafter conducted exercises with British units before leaving Yokosuka on November 16 to return to San Diego on December 2.
In the spring of 1960 she was overhauled at the Puget Sound naval shipyard .
The next Lexington voyage to the Far East began in the second half of the year and extended until 1961 due to renewed tensions in Laos .
After returning from operations on the west coast, she was relocated to the Atlantic in January 1962 to replace the USS Antietam (CVS-36) as a training aircraft carrier in the Gulf of Mexico . On October 1, 1962, the Lexington was reclassified to anti-submarine carrier (CVS-16), but remained in service as an attack aircraft carrier for a few months during the Cuban Missile Crisis . It was not until December 29, 1963 before she took over the duties of the USS Antietam as a training aircraft carrier from her new base in Pensacola .
For almost thirty years, Lexington operated from its base in Pensacola, but also from Corpus Christi and New Orleans in the Gulf of Mexico. It represented a seaworthy training platform for aspiring and experienced naval aviators. On October 17, 1967, the Lexington was the 200,000. Landing carried out. In January 1969 it was reclassified as a school carrier in CVT-16 and another nine years later in AVT-16 (Auxiliary Aircraft Landing Training Ship). Finally, after 48 years of service , the USS Lexington was decommissioned on November 8, 1991.
Retirement and whereabouts
The USS Lexington was the last Essex-class aircraft carrier to be entered on the US Navy's Naval Vessel Register . Most of the aircraft landings carried out on a carrier were counted on it: 493,248 in total.
On June 15, 1992 the USS Lexington was handed over to a private organization and has since been a museum ship in Corpus Christi , Texas at the position 27 ° 48 ′ 54 ″ N , 97 ° 23 ′ 19 ″ W . In July 2003, the ship was entered as a structure on the National Register of Historic Places and declared a National Historic Landmark .
Lexington received the Presidential Unit Citation and eleven battle stars for World War II service.
Individual evidence
- ↑ USS Lexington on the National Register of Historic Places , accessed February 24, 2020.
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↑ USS Lexington on the National Register of Historic Places , accessed February 24, 2020.
Listing of National Historic Landmarks by State: Texas. National Park Service , accessed February 24, 2020.
Web links
- USS Lexington at navysite.de (engl.)
- Off. Site of the USS Lexington Museum on the Bay in Corpus Christi, TX (Engl.)