USS Nehenta Bay (CVE-74)

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USS Nehenta Bay (CVE-74) underway transporting aircraft, circa 1945.jpg
Overview
Order 1942
Keel laying July 20, 1943
Launch November 28, 1943
1. Period of service flag
Commissioning January 3, 1944
Decommissioning May 14, 1946
Whereabouts scrapped
Technical specifications
displacement

7800  ts (standard)
10,400 ts (application)

length

156.2 m

width

32.9 m

Draft

6.9 m

crew

860

drive

4 piston steam engines, 9000 HP on two propellers

speed

19 kn

Range

10,200 nm at 15 kn

Armament
Planes

28

The USS Nehenta Bay (CVE-74) was an escort aircraft carrier in the United States Navy and belonged to the Casablanca class . The carrier was in service with the US Navy from January 1944 to May 1946.

history

The keel-laying of Nehenta Bay took place on July 20, 1943 at Kaiser Shipyards in Vancouver , Washington . On November 28, 1943, the ship, christened by Mrs. Robert H. Smith, was launched. Originally the ship was supposed to go to the Royal Navy as HMS Khedive , instead the British received the USS Cordova . The Nehenta Bay was acquired by the US Navy on January 3, 1944, and on the same day in Astoria , Oregon found under the command of Captain Horace A. Butterfield into service.

The first voyage took Nehenta Bay on February 6 from San Francisco Bay to Pearl Harbor , where it arrived six days later. She transported flight crews and replacement aircraft. She arrived in San Diego on February 21 with a load of damaged aircraft . After a few maneuvers off the US west coast, the carrier set sail again for Hawaii on March 18, again loaded with aircraft and spare parts, which it delivered on April 7 in the Majuro Atoll to the aircraft carriers anchored there. Nehenta Bay returned to San Diego on April 27 with a load of damaged aircraft and wounded from Majuro and Pearl Harbor .

After some maneuvers off the coast of California and off Hawaii, Nehenta Bay left Pearl Harbor on June 18 to support the Battle of the Mariana Islands . At the end of the month, she arrived in Eniwetok , where she was assigned to Task Force 51. Their planes flew anti- submarine patrols during the Battle of Tinian and attacked Japanese positions on the island on July 5th and 7th. On July 16, Nehenta Bay ran back into Eniwetok, where supplies were bunkered. Together with the USS Midway and twelve destroyers, she then ran into the sea area around Guam and Saipan , where anti-submarine and combat patrols were carried out.

The Nehenta Bay was in August 1944, the Nachschuberverbänden the US 3rd Fleet assigned as escort. In December 1944, she had to fight her way through Typhoon Cobra , and suffered minor damage. On January 12, 1945, their planes shot down an attacking Japanese bomber. On February 19, Nehenta Bay ran back into San Diego, where it was overhauled. After a few maneuvers off Hawaii and pilot training off Guam, she arrived in Ulithi on May 9 , where she was assigned to the fleet for the attack on Okinawa . The Nehenta Bay aircraft secured the airspace over the fleet during the Battle of Okinawa , but also supported the attacking ground troops. On June 7, their formation was caught in a kamikaze attack in which two escort carriers were sunk.

From the end of June to early August 1945, the Nehenta Bay was again assigned as an escort for the supply units of the 3rd Fleet, at the time of the surrender of Japan , she was on the way to the Aleutians . Your task force set course for Japan on August 31. On September 24, the porter arrived in Hawaii, where she was being prepared for Operation Magic Carpet . On September 30th, Nehenta Bay left Hawaii to bring troops from the Marshall Islands to the US west coast, where they arrived in San Francisco in mid-October. Another Magic Carpet trip from the Philippines ended on November 27th.

The Nehenta Bay crossed the end of the year 1945 Panama Canal and met on January 31, 1946 in Boston , where it was placed and on May 15, 1946 decommissioned mothballed in reserve. It was reclassified to CVU-74 on June 12, 1955, AKV-24 on May 7, 1959, before being sold to Coalmarket, Inc. for scrapping on June 29, 1960.

The Nehenta Bay received seven battle stars for their efforts during World War II.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b USS Nehenta Bay at navysite.de; As of December 18, 2009