Category Archives: littoral

The Guardian of the Mouth of the Mississippi

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Here we see the mighty 55-foot powerboat-turned-patrol craft, USS Wendy (SP-448), underway during the Great War, likely around the Mississippi Sound to Venice, Louisiana area.

The original print is in the National Archives’ Record Group 19-LCM. U.S. Naval History and Heritage Command Photograph. Catalog #: NH 102519

Note Sailor manning her bow gun, a 1-pounder. Wendy’s stern weapon is a Colt M1895 Potato Digger style machine gun. She is flying a 48-star Jack on her starboard signal halliard. Powered by a 40hp 4-cylinder Murray and Tregurtha gasoline engine, she could make 9 knots.

The former pleasure craft was built in 1913 by the Jahncke Navigation Co., New Orleans. Acquired by the Navy on 1 July 1917 and placed in commission on 3 August. She was decommissioned and returned to her owner on 9 December 1918.

Fjord-nance

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During a recent mine warfare exercise by Standing NATO Mine Countermeasures Group One (SNMCMG1), the flotilla identified 170 curious underwater objects along the seabed of Norway’s Oslofjord.

After they were examined more closely by underwater remote-controlled vehicles (ROVs) or mine clearance divers, it turned out that 35 were underwater mines and three more were aircraft bombs, in other words, 38 pieces of live ordnance, most dating back to WWII when the fjord was the subject of the sharp fight in April 1940 during the German invasion and a longer RAF campaign in the resulting Axis occupation.

Of note, the flag of SNMCMG1 is the German Navy’s Type 404/Elbe-class supply tender Donau (A516) coupled with the minesweepers HNoMS OTRA (Norway), HNLMS Willemstad (Netherlands), BNS Bellis (Belgium), and HMS Grimsby (Great Britain).

From the left: HNLMS Willemstad, BNS Bellis, FGS Donau, HMS Grimsby, HNoMS Otra linked together for a photo during Standing NATO Mine Countermeasures Group One (SNMCMG1) historic ordnance disposal operations in Oslofjord, Norway on March 1, 2020. Photo by: PO Marius Vagenes Villanger

The group is sure to remain busy in the coming years. It is estimated around 1,800 mines remain in the Oslofjord from the war.

“The NATO group regularly conducts Historical Ordnance Disposal operations or ‘HOD Ops’ in coordination with Allied Navies as a way to sharpen the skills of the group on real mines and other ordnance as well as provide a service to nations by identifying and neutralizing (as needed) naval mines from previous conflicts.”

LCS to get Laser Zapper

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Artist’s rendering of Lockheed Martin’s HELIOS system. The company picked up a $150 million contract to develop it for the Navy in 2018 to include a high-energy laser system for use against drones and small boats, a long-range ISR capability, and a counter-UAS dazzler capability. The version company’s LLD for use on the LCS is undoubtedly smaller but likely with the same attributes. Credit: Lockheed Martin

From DoD:

Lockheed Martin Corp., Baltimore, Maryland, is awarded a $22,436,852 letter contract for the integration, demonstration, testing and operation of the Layered Laser Defense (LLD) weapon system prototype onboard a Navy littoral combat ship while that vessel is underway. Work will be performed in Moorestown, New Jersey (30%); Baltimore, Maryland (25%); Sunnyvale, California (12%); Woodinville, Washington (10%); Manassas, Virginia (5%); Dallas, Texas (15%); San Diego, California (2%); and Santa Cruz, California (1%). Key areas of work to be performed include development of a prototype structure and enclosure to protect the LLD from ships motion and maritime environment in a mission module format; system integration and test with government-furnished equipment; platform integration and system operational verification and test; systems engineering; test planning; data collection and analysis support; and operational demonstration. Work is expected to be complete by July 2021.

The total cumulative value of this contract is $22,436,852. The base period is $22,436,852 and no options are proposed. The action will be incrementally funded with an initial obligation of $11,218,426 utilizing fiscal 2019 research, development, and test and evaluation (Defense-wide) funds will expire at the end of the current fiscal year. This contract was competitively procured under N00014-20-S-B001, “Long Range Broad Agency Announcement (BAA) for Navy and Marine Corps Science & Technology.” Since proposals are received throughout the year under the long-range BAA, the number of proposals received in response to the solicitation is unknown. The Office of Naval Research, Arlington, Virginia, is the contracting activity (N00014-20-C-1003).

A more LCS-like laser system from Lockheed-Martin is their Advanced Test High Energy Asset (ATHENA) device recently tested by the Air Force to splash drones at Fort Sill.

The radar track was provided to airmen who operated ATHENA via cues from the C2, then ATHENA’s beam director slewed, acquired, tracked and defeated the drone with a high-energy laser.

The ATHENA system shown here destroyed multiple drones in a real-world demonstration for the Air Force. Could it be coming to an LCS near you?

Cuban-born micro submarine spotted in the wild

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Esteemed submarine nerd HI Sutton of Covert Shores, writing for Forbes, covers a recent sighting of the rarely-seen Cuban midget submarine, Delfin.

Sutton writes, noting that only two images have surfaced in 15 years of the 65-foot home-rolled sub:

Delfin is Cuba’s sole submarine. Back during the Cold War, the Cuban Navy had three attack submarines supplied by the Soviet Union. But like most of their larger ships, these have long since been retired. Today the Cuban Navy operates a hodgepodge of vintage Soviet equipment, converted fishing trawlers with missiles and helicopters, and an array of improvised torpedo craft. The Delfin is the most impressive of these homegrown vessels.

More here. 

LCS may actually get their drone minesweeper, afterall

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The idea behind the littoral combat ship program is that it would take the place of the aging de-fanged Oliver Hazard Perry-class FFs– which had their original missile batteries neutered– as well as the Navy’s mine countermeasure vessels.

While the first could be done through with the light armament (57mm Mk110, Sea-RAM, small arms) and embarked helicopters/UAVs coupled (hopefully) with some sort of modular towed array, the latter required a legit standoff minesweeping vehicle as an LCS, with their steel hulls, is less than ideal for that.

That’s where Textron comes in, producing a 40-foot semi-autonomous, diesel-powered, all-aluminum surface craft, rigged to tow the same sweep gear used by the MH-53 Sea Dragon helicopters and/or ROVs.

The company on Thursday announced the U.S. Navy’s Unmanned Influence Sweep System (UISS) program, which is based on its Common Unmanned Surface Vehicle (CUSV), has achieved a Milestone C decision. The decision allows the program to enter low-rate initial production (LRIP), with the Navy planning to award three UISS systems to Textron Systems under their existing contract.

The Unmanned Influence Sweep System (UISS), based on Textron’s CUSV. It tows the modified Mk-104 system acoustic generator and a magnetic minesweeping cable.

More from NAVSEA:

The Program Executive Officer for Unmanned and Small Combatants (PEO USC) has granted Milestone C approval to the Unmanned Influence Sweep System (UISS) program. The decision clears the way for low-rate initial production (LRIP) of the system, PEO USC announced Feb. 26, 2020.

The Navy plans to exercise options for the procurement of three LRIP systems on the current Engineering and Manufacturing Development (EMD) contract with UISS prime contractor Textron Systems.

Designed for the littoral combat ship (LCS) as part of the mine countermeasures mission package, the UISS consists of a mine countermeasures unmanned surface vehicle (USV) and a towed minesweeping payload for influence sweeping of magnetic, acoustic and magnetic/acoustic combination mine types. UISS can also be launched from vessels of opportunity or from shore.

Formal Developmental Testing and Operational Assessment of UISS took place off the coast of South Florida and successfully concluded in late November 2019. Testing included a series of end-to-end minesweeping missions against simulated mine targets using the Navy Instrumented Threat Targets training system.

LCS Detachment Sailors performed operations during Developmental Testing and Operational Assessment that included shore-based launch and retrieval of the system, command, and control, mission planning and post-mission analysis. The UISS USV also has completed initial integration tests with the LCS and vessels of opportunity.

Textron Systems was awarded an EMD contract in October 2014 for the UISS, based on its Common USV. The Navy exercised options for two additional vehicles in 2017, which were delivered in 2018 in support of the comprehensive Mine Countermeasures Unmanned Surface Vehicle program that will leverage the UISS USV for missions that include minehunting and mine neutralization.

Textron is expected to begin the delivery of LRIP systems in fiscal 2021.

The Unmanned Influence Sweep System (UISS) heads offshore at sunrise for an Operational Assessment mission off the coast of South Florida in November 2019.

The Unmanned Influence Sweep System (UISS), November 2019. 200226-N-IJ355-001

The nuts and bolts of the contract announcement:

AAI Corp. (doing business as Textron Systems), Hunt Valley, Maryland, is awarded a $21,795,236 fixed-price incentive modification to previously awarded contract N00024-14-C-6322 for low rate initial production for the Unmanned Influence Sweep System (UISS) Unmanned Surface Vehicle Program. Work will be performed in Hunt Valley, Maryland (70%), and Slidell, Louisiana (30%), and is expected to be completed by August 2021. The UISS will allow the littoral combat ship to perform its mine countermeasure sweep mission and will target acoustic, magnetic, and magnetic/acoustic combination mine types. The UISS program will satisfy the Navy’s need for a rapid, wide-area coverage mine clearance capability, required to neutralize magnetic/acoustic influence mines. UISS seeks to provide a high area coverage rate in a small, lightweight package with minimal impact on the host platform. Fiscal 2018 other procurement (Navy) and fiscal 2019 other procurement (Navy) funding in the amount of $21,795,236 will be obligated at the time of the award. Funds in the amount of $7,950,616 will expire at the end of the current fiscal year. The Naval Sea Systems Command, Washington, District of Columbia, is the contracting activity.

In directly related news, Northrop Grumman’s AQS-24 mine hunting sonar completing initial in-water testing of a next-generation Deploy and Retrieval (D&R) payload. “Operated from the Mine Countermeasures Unmanned Surface Vessel (MCM USV), the AQS-24 D&R demonstrates the unmanned operations needed to perform a mine-hunting mission off the MCM Mission Package aboard the littoral combat ship (LCS).”

It looks pretty swag.

Battlewagon in the anti-ship missile age, 29 years ago today

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While primitive guided bombs and missiles were fielded in WWII (see = the U.S. Navy’s SWOD-9 Bat and the sinking of the Italian battleship Roma in 1943 by an air-launched Fritz X) it wasn’t until the P-15 Termit (NATO: SS-N-2 Styx) was developed by the Soviets in 1958 that a reliable surfaced-launched anti-ship missile was fielded. Soon answered in the West by the Swedish Saab Rb 08 and Israeli Gabriel in the 1960s, then by more advanced platforms such as Exocet and Harpoon, such weapons replaced coastal artillery batteries as well as surfaced-launched torpedos as the principal means for asymmetric forces to effect a “kill” on a capital ship.

Likewise, the age of the dreadnought and large all-gun-armed cruiser was fading at the same time.

The four Iowa-class fast battleships were mothballed in 1958 (but, of course, New Jersey would be brought back for a tour in Vietnam while all four would be returned to service in the 1980s for the Cold War– more on that later) while the British retired HMS Vanguard in 1960 while the Soviets had gotten out of the battlewagon biz in the late 1950s after their Italian trophy ship Novorossiysk (ex-Giulio Cesare) blew up and their circa 1911 Gangut-class “school battleships” finally gave up the ghost. The French held on to Jean Bart until 1970, although she had been in reserve since after the Suez affair in 1956.

With that, it was no surprise that when the quartet of Iowas was reactivated in the 1980s to play a role in Reagan’s 600-ship Navy, they were “modernized” with 32 Tomahawk cruise missiles fired from eight funky four-shot armored box launchers as well as 16 Harpoon anti-ship missiles in place of some of their WWII-era retired AAA gun mounts. In a nod to the facts, the missiles all out-ranged the battleships’ gun armament.

Fast forward to the 1st Gulf War and Mighty Mo, USS Missouri (BB-63), chunked 28 Tomahawks and 783 rounds of 16-inch shells at Saddam’s forces while dodging a Persian Gulf filled with naval mines of all flavors– as well as the occasional anti-ship missile counterfire.

16-inch (410 mm) guns fired aboard the battleship USS MISSOURI (BB-63) as night shelling of Iraqi targets takes place along the northern Kuwaiti coast during Operation Desert Storm. Date 6 February 1991. Photo by PH3 Dillon. DN-ST-91-09306

As for Missouri, the Iowas were not able to carry Sea Sparrow point defense launchers as they could not be shock-hardened to deal with the vibration from the battleship’s main guns, so they had an air defense provided by soft kill countermeasures such as chaff, decoys, and ducks; along with a quartet of CIWS 20mm Phalanx guns and five Stinger MANPAD stations– meaning a modern anti-ship missile would have to be killed either by an escort or at very close range. Good thing the Iowas had as much as 19.5-inches of armor plate!

While closing in with the enemy-held coastline to let her 16s reach out and touch someone on 23 February 1991, Missouri came in-range of a battery of shore-based Chinese-made CSS-C-2 Silkworm anti-ship missiles. One missed while the second was intercepted by Sea Darts from a nearby screening destroyer, the Type 42-class HMS Gloucester (D96). The intercepted Silkworm splashed down about 700 yards from Missouri.

USS Missouri under Attack by Iraqi Silkworm Painting, Oil on Canvas Board; by John Charles Roach; 1991; Framed Dimensions 28H X 34W Accession #: 92-007-U
Official caption: “While providing gunfire support to harass the Iraqi troops in Kuwait in preparation for a possible amphibious landing, USS Missouri (BB-63) was fired upon by an Iraqi Silkworm anti-ship missile. By the use of infrared flares and chaff, the missile’s guidance was confused. It crossed close astern of Missouri and was engaged and shot down by HMS Gloucester (D-96).”

The AP reported at the time:

Royal Navy Commander John Tighe told reporters two Sea Dart missiles were fired by the Gloucester less than 50 seconds after the ship’s radar detected the incoming Iraqi missiles at about 5 a.m.

Tighe said one Sea Dart scored a direct hit, destroying the Iraqi missile. He said a second missile launched by the Iraqis veered into the sea.

The commander said allied airplanes subsequently attacked the Silkworm missile launch site. He said that while he had not received a battle damage assessment, he was ″fairly confident that site will not be used to launch missiles against the ships again.”

Missouri did take some damage that day, from CIWS rounds fired by the escorting frigate USS Jarrett (FFG-33), which had locked on to one of the battleship’s chaff clouds and opened fire. One sailor was wounded by 20mm DU shrapnel.

Today, battleships left the Naval List for the final time in 1995 and all that made it that far are preserved as museums. The missiles, however, endure.

Oh that? That’s just my CUSV, thanks for asking

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NORFOLK, Va. (Feb. 12, 2020) A developmental, early variant of the Common Unmanned Surface Vehicle (CUSV) autonomously conducts maneuvers on the Elizabeth River during its demonstration during Citadel Shield-Solid Curtain 2020 at Naval Station Norfolk. (U.S. Navy photos by Mass Communication Specialist 3rd Class Rebekah M. Rinckey/Released)

The Navy has been testing an armed 40-foot drone boat developed by Textron at Norfolk this month.

From Maritime Executive: 

The Common Unmanned Surface Vehicle (CUSV), built by the defense conglomerate Textron, is a 40-foot remotely-operated launch with long endurance and range. CUSV was designed in the 2000s as a component of the Littoral Combat Ship (LCS) mine countermeasures “mission package.” It has large towing and payload capacities for minesweeping and mine neutralization systems, and it was designed to be modular and adaptable for a variety of other tasks.

…

The CUSV test during Solid Curtain aimed to evaluate the platform’s suitability for defending moored warships – in this case, the destroyer USS Arleigh Burke and the carrier USS John C. Stennis. The boat was fitted with a remotely-operated .50 caliber machine gun station with cameras, sensors and a data link to a control station on shore. During the exercise, it intercepted a suspect boat (a manned Navy launch) and hailed it, then fired simulated shots to “disable” it.

The vessel likely has several radar reflectors to make it seem bigger to local traffic. In a real-world scenario, this bad boy could prove interesting in a littoral

The auto .50 seems to be an FN/M3 remote control mount with an LRAD

Pierside. Note the 41-foot ex-USCG UTM behind it, for scale

A better view

Warship Wednesday Jan 22, 2020: Oh, Mr. Volstead, what have you done?

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Here at LSOZI, we are going to take off every Wednesday for a look at the old steam/diesel navies of the 1833-1946 time period and will profile a different ship each week. These ships have a life, a tale all their own, which sometimes takes them to the strangest places.- Christopher Eger

Warship Wednesday, Jan 22, 2020: Oh, Mr. Volstead, what have you done?

U.S. Coast Guard Historian’s Office

Here we see, a U.S. Coast Guard Loening OL-5L seaplane flying majestically over a pair of new-built 75-foot “six-bitter” patrol boats, likely around 1927 off Glouchester, Mass. While the Coasties only operated three OL-5s, they went much bigger on the contract for the 75-footers.

The so-called “noble experiment” that was perhaps always doomed to fail, Congressman Andrew Volstead’s championed 18th Amendment, which survived President Woodrow Wilson’s veto to bring about an official prohibition on liquor from sea to shining sea, became the law of the land on 17 January 1920– 100 years ago this month.

However, all it did was spark a new war, the so-called Rum War, which pitted federal law enforcement against often international smugglers and criminal syndicates of all sizes. Increasingly, this forerunner of the War on Drugs became an actual military campaign.

Rum Runners in Canada and in the Bahamas had the cry, “For some, there’s a fortune but others will die, come on load up the ship boys, the Yankees are dry.”

That’s where the Coast Guard came in.

Charged with policing “Rum Row,” the line of booze-laden ships parked just off the international limit with all the best Canadian whiskey, Cuban rum and bottles of European hooch rushed to the thirsty market, the USCG was rapidly expanded to sever the link between this liquor line and coastal bootleggers in fast boats, fishing luggers and skiffs. Some 10 million quarts of liquor left Nassau alone in 1922, headed to points West.

To do this, the service was loaned a whole fleet of mothballed Navy destroyers (20), subchasers (21), and Eagle boats (5) leftover from the Great War as well as being granted a sweeping raft of new construction. Between 1924 and 1926, the USCG doubled in size from 5,900 to 10,000 uniformed personnel, a manning crisis that caused the Coast Guard Academy to switch to a two-year program to speed up the pipeline for new officers.

The largest group of new vessels, at least in terms of hulls and manpower to sail them, were the 203 “cabin cruiser-style” patrol boats that are the subject of our tale.

At 75-feet overall length, these humble craft became known in service as “six-biters.”

“Old 75-foot patrol boat.” Photo No. 34363; photo dated 15 February 1928; photo by Joseph N. Pearce. USCG Historian’s office

Equipped with two 6-cylinder gasoline engines, they could make 15.7 knots with their powerplant wide open and sortie out for about a week or so until their eight-man crew ran out of groceries or the 1,000-gallon fuel tank started sounding hollow.

Initially, they were to be armed with a single 3″/23 caliber gun, considered good enough to fire a warning shot across the bow of a bootlegger. However, to save weight, these patrol craft instead were equipped with a single-shot one-pounder 37mm gun of about 1898 vintage. Nevertheless, the go-to weapons for their crews were small arms.

CG-222

To speed things up, these patrol boats were mass-produced in 1924 and 1925 by nearly 20 yards, both public and private, simultaneously with hull prices running between $18,000 and $26,000 per vessel. Their construction, of white oak frames and keel with fir and yellow pine planking and bulwarks, ensured their short lifespan but quick construction.

CG-283, note her crew hailing a ship forward

They were built to a design finalized by noted yacht maker John Trumpy. With simply too many cutters to name, they were numbered CG-100 through CG-302 and delivered on an average of four to five cutters per week.

Via U.S. Coast Guard Cutters and Craft of WWII by Dr. Robert Schenia.

The boats soon swarmed the coastline from Maine to the Florida Keys, along the Gulf Coast, and from Seattle down to San Diego while others served on the Great Lakes.

Six-Bitters and Destroyers at New London, 1926

SIx-Bitters tied up at Base 7 in Gloucester, 1928, NARA

Camden-produced Six-bitters at Cape May

The renewed offensive on booze escalated as the development forced the slower bootleggers, in other words, the part-timers using trawlers and sailboats, dropped out of the business and left the heavy lifting to professionals, and increasingly armed and squirrely smugglers.

Six-Bitters out of Base 7 at Gloucester, 1928, NARA

Six-Bitters leaving Base 7 at Gloucester, 1928 NARA

In one incident, with the Liberty-engined fast craft Black Duck and the 75-foot cutter CG-290, the bootlegger zigged when they should have zagged while blasting away from the slow patrol boat and got a blast of Lewis gun in the boathouse, killing two rumrunners and wounding another two.

Coast Guard Section Base, East Boston, 1929. Pictured are 75′ cutters (Six Bitters), 125′ cutters (Buck and a Quarters) and the captured rum runner, the Black Duck.

Rum Runner ‘Black Duck’ escorted by Coast Guard boats to Newport, RI harbor after CG-290 fired shots killing two of the crew, January 1930. Photo by Leslie Jones via Boston Public Library, Print Department.

Another incident, between the six-bitter CG-249 and the motorboat V-13997 while en route to Bimini, left the cutter’s skipper, BM Sidney C. Chamberlain, killed in a one-way shootout and two other Coasties wounded.

In a sign of the times, the master of V-139977 who pulled the trigger, James Horace Alderman was convicted of three counts of murder and piracy on the high seas, was captured and two years later was hung in the seaplane hangar at the Fort Lauderdale Coast Guard station. Alderman was the only man ever hung by the organization. 

“Fort Lauderdale, Sec. Base Six, Dec. 6, 1926, The Commandant looking over the latest capture.” Photo No. B-6/4, #21; 1926; photographer unknown.

“U.S. Coast Guard 75-ft. Patrol Boat CG-262 towing into San Francisco Harbor her prizes, the tug ELCISCO and barge REDWOOD CITY, seized for violation of U.S. Customs laws.” Photo No. CPI-02-24-27 GEN.; 1927; photographer unknown.

$175,000 in liquor seized in Dorchester Bay by Coast Guard men from Base 5. Brought to US Customs Appraisers’ Stores. 18 Jan 1932. Note the 75, CG-171. Photo by Leslie Jones via Boston Public Library, Print Department.

These cutters of course also contributed to traditional USCG missions such as search and rescue and fisheries enforcement. In fact, once Prohibition was repealed in 1933, it became their primary tasking. This led to 52 of the vessels being quickly passed to the Army, Navy, and USC&GS for use as dispatch boats for coastal defense batteries, district patrol craft (YPs), and survey ships.

Coast Guard boat CG-139 at Boston June 1929, Boston Public Library Leslie Jones Collection

Coast Guard boat CG-242 at Boston 1928, note her 1-pounder. Boston Public Library Leslie Jones Collection

A quarter of very clean Coast Guard 75 footers on the Thames River, New London, CT 1934. Photo by Leslie Jones

Others suffered losses while in service. CG-114 was lost at sea in 1925 only weeks after she was completed. The “Great Miami” hurricane in September 1926 wrecked CG-247 and CG-248. A similar cyclone in 1928 claimed CG-188. CG-111, CG-113, CG-256, and CG-243 were lost in fires, groundings or collisions. C-245 went down in unexpected heavy seas within view of El Morro Fortress in 1935. CG-102, which at the time was serving as YP-5 with the Navy, accidentally caught a practice torpedo in 1938 and sank.

Yet others were sold off for their value as scrap.

By 1941 when the Coast Guard was chopped to the Navy’s service, Only 36 were still on the USCG’s list, although six that had previously been sold to the public were re-acquired and put back to use.

CG-172 at Key West in 1942, note her .50 caliber water-cooled gun in addition to her 1-pdr and dark scheme

As an update with the times and to acknowledge they were intended to fight U-boats and Japanese submarines, the lingering six-bitters picked up a 20mm/80 Oerlikon AAA gun or .50 caliber machine gun forward, and two depth charge racks aft. Likewise, most received QBE sonar listening sets and BK detection radars late in the war. They were used for inshore convoy escort, coastal anti-submarine patrol, and port security duties.

During the war, CG-74327, one of the renumbered six-bitters who started life as CG-211, was sunk in a collision with the Tench-class submarine USS Thornback (SS-418) of Portsmouth in November 1944, claiming the life of BM2 Ireneus K. Augustynowicz. CG-152, as YP-1947, similarly sank in a collision while in Navy service in 1943. CG-267, stationed in Guam in 1941 as YP-16, was scuttled to prevent capture by the Japanese. Sistership CG-275, serving at Guam as YP-17, was scuttled but later salvaged and used by the Japanese. 

By 1946, the smattering of six-bitters still in the Navy and USCG service was transferred to MARAD and sold off. Many of the 75-foot craft went on to endure for another couple decades as yachts, fishing vessels, houseboats, and research ships. I cannot find an example of one that was still afloat today.

Still, the legacy of the rowdy wooden six-bitters is today upheld by the Coast Guard’s 87-foot Marine Protector-class patrol boats.

Specs:

(Coast Guard Historian’s Office)

Displacement: 37 tons designed, 42 tons (1945)
Length: 74.9 feet
Beam: 13.75 feet
Draft: 3.6 feet as designed, 5 feet (1945)
Machinery: Sterling 6cyl gas engines, 400 SHP, twin screws
Speed: 15.7 designed, although some made 17 when new.
Crew: 8 as designed, 13 in 1945
Armament:
1 x 37mm 1-pounder as designed, small arms
1x 20mm/80cal and/or 12.7mm machine gun, 2 depth charge racks in WWII.

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STAVE-LCS

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I thought this was interesting in how the Navy trains using the Surface Training Advanced Virtual Environment for the Littoral Combat Ship (STAVE-LCS). Hopefully one day the actual ships will mature and fit the bill they were designed to pay, or at least hold the line until a frigate program can be developed.

Warship Wednesday Jan 8, 2020: Maru Floatplane Carriers

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Here at LSOZI, we are going to take off every Wednesday for a look at the old steam/diesel navies of the 1833-1946 time period and will profile a different ship each week. These ships have a life, a tale all their own, which sometimes takes them to the strangest places. – Christopher Eger

Warship Wednesday, Jan 8, 2020: Maru Floatplane Carriers

Colorized photo by Atsushi Yamashita/Monochrome Specter http://blog.livedoor.jp/irootoko_jr/

Here we see the Kamikawa Maru-class cargo ship, Kimikawa Maru, converted to a Tokusetsu Suijokibokan (special seaplane carrier) of the Imperial Japanese Navy, at Oominato in northern Honshu, in late 1942. As you can tell, this interesting ship and her sisters could carry a serious load of armed, and often very effective, floatplanes.

Constructed in the late 1930s through a joint endeavor of the Japanese shipping firm Ōsaka Mercantile and Kawasaki Kisen in the latter’s Kobe-based shipyard, the five 6,800-ton ships of the class were intended for the Japan-New York route, a trip of some 15,000 nautical miles. This was no sweat as, using a single efficient MAN-designed Kawasaki-made diesel, they had an incredible 35,000nm range at 17 knots.

However, these ships were also ready to chip in should the Empire require it.

As noted in ONI 208-J, the U.S. Navy’s 400+ page WWII intelligence book on the 1,300 assorted Japanese merchant ships over 1,000-tons:

Modern Japanese merchant ship design provides for deck-gun positions up to 5-inch or 6-inch caliber, the largest pieces being hand-loaded under service conditions. Heavier framing and plating and large diameter stanchions (extending down through two decks) are built in integral parts of the hull to support these positions. Ventilator trunks are conveniently arraigned close by for rapid conversion to ammunition hoists. These trunks always lead to specially prepared watertight compartments suitable for use as magazines. Dual-purpose 3-inch guns and anti-aircraft machine guns are often mounted in rows on lateral platforms.

As such, the U.S. Navy was very interested in these ships on the lead-up to the war, with several high-res images of these vessels taken in the 1930s as they transited the Panama Canal, still located in the ONI’s files.

KAMIKAWA MARU Japanese Merchant Ship Port bow view taken off Panama on 23 July 1937 NH 45577

KAMIKAWA MARU Japanese Merchant Ship overhead taken off Panama on 23 July 1937 NH 45576

KUNIKAWA MARU in Gatun Lake, Panama Canal. Altitude 1000 feet, Lens 10 inches. December 22, 1937, NH 111574

Japanese Ship KUNIKAWA MARU. Panama Canal. Altitude 1000 feet, Lens 10 inches. March 11, 1938. NH 111576

Kamikawa Maru-class cargo ship as AP AV, via ONI 208-J 1942

Kamikawa Maru-class cargo ship, via ONI 208-J 1942

With Japan increasingly embroiled in the conflict in China, the Kimikawa Maru-class vessels were soon called up for service, many years before Pearl Harbor.

Notably, four out of the five– Kamikawa Maru, Kiyokawa Maru, Kimikawa Maru, and Kunikawa Maru (nothing confusing about that) were converted to armed seaplane carriers, capable of carrying more than a dozen such single-engine floatplanes aft, for which they had two catapults installed to launch them and large boom cranes for recovery. They would also be equipped with as many as six 4.7- or 5.9-inch guns as well as several smaller AAA mounts and machine guns.

Kawanishi E17K “Alf ” (Japanese floatplane) Being hoisted aboard a Japanese seaplane tender, circa 1939. Note details of the aircraft handling crane NH 82463

Alternatively, twice that many aircraft could be carried stowed below, to be assembled and deployed at some far-off port or atoll if need be. Four similar Mitsubishi-built freighters– Noshiro Maru, Sagara Maru, Sanuki Maru, and Sanyo Maru— were also converted but could only carry about eight seaplanes each. Subsequently, these less successful vessels would be re-rated to transports by 1942.

Notably, many of the IJN’s carrier commanders and admirals learned their trade on these special seaplane carriers to include RADMs Ando Shigeaki, Hattori Katsugi, Shinoda Tarohachi, Matsuda Takatomo, Hara Seitaro, and Yokokawa Ichihei; VADMs Arima Masafumi, Yamada Michiyuki, and Omori Sentaro.

In the late 1930s, their airwing would include Kawanishi E17K (Alf) and Nakajima E8N Type 95 (Dave) scout aircraft, primitive single-float biplanes that couldn’t break 175 knots and carried just a few small bombs and a couple machine guns for self-defense. These would later be augmented by planes like the Mitsubishi F1M2 Pete.

KAMIKAWA MARU (Japanese seaplane tender, 1936) Anchored off Amoy, China, 16 July 1939, with a deck load of KAWANISHI E17K-2 and NAKAJIMA E8N floatplanes both forward and aft. I can count at least 14 aircraft. This vessel, the first of the class converted to a seaplane carrier, saw extensive service in Chinese waters in 1938 to 1940, with her planes often bombing and strafing key Chinese positions. NH 82154

F1M Japanese Pete Kamikawa Maru’s ZII tail code 1940-41

Another view of the same

By 1942, this airwing would grow to as many as 14 much more capable Aichi E13A Type Zero (Jake) armed reconnaissance planes and four Daves– the airwing Kamikawa Maru took to Alaska during the Midway operation. Later types like the Nakajima A6M2-N (Rufe) Type 2 Sui-Sen (‘Rufe’) floatplane version of the Zero fighter soon joined them.

At least four Japanese navy pilots chalked up at least three kills while at the controls of floatplanes, most in the A6M-2N: CPO Shigeji Kawai, WO Kiyomi Katsuki, CPO Keizo Yamaza, and CPO Maruyama, although it should be noted that Katuski downed his first aircraft, a Dutch KNIL PBY, while flying an F1M2 Pete. Katsuki, who had 16 kills, spent at least some of his time flying from Kamikawa Maru.

IJN Seaplane Tender Kamikawa Maru in 1942, likely taken from Kimikawa Maru as her X tail code is on the Jake

E13A-34 Aichi with Kimikawa Maru’s X tail code

Their tail codes:

  • Kamikawa Maru– ZII (15 November 1940) ZI (September 1941) Z (May 1942) YI (14 July 1942)
    L-1 (1943)
  • Kunikawa Maru– YII tail code (November 1942) L-2 (January 1943)
  • Kiyokawa Maru– R (1941) RI (14 July 1942–November 1942)
  • Kimikawa Maru– X (December 1941) C21 (1943)

Once the big balloon went up in December 1941, these four freighters-turned-carriers were used extensively across the Pacific.

Kamikawa Maru would participate in the Malaya campaign and the Battle of the Coral Sea then sail with the fleet for Midway, going on to play a big part in the Aleutians campaign. She would then switch to the Guadalcanal Campaign, and be sent to the bottom by torpedoes from USS Scamp (SS-277) northwest of Kavieng, New Ireland in May 1943.

Mitsubishi F1M2 Pete reconnaissance floatplane on the catapult of the seaplane carrier Kamikawa Maru, 1942

A6M2-N Type 2 floatplane fighter, Sep-Oct 1942, on seaplane tender Kamikawa Maru

Japanese Navy Aichi E13A seaplane, most likely from the seaplane tender Kamikawa Maru. The location of the photo is unknown but may be at Deboyne Islands in May 1942 during the Battle of the Coral Sea.

Kamikawa Maru, with a deck chock full of planes

A6M2-N ‘Rufe’ seaplane pilots deployed from the Kamikawa Maru under the command of ace Kiyomi Katsuki, in middle, digging a trench in the Aleutians, 1943.

Kiyokawa Maru helped capture Guam and Wake Island in December 1941, then was later rerated as a transport. She was ultimately sunk in an air raid at Kaminoseki in 1945 but was later raised and returned to a brief merchant career.

A6M2 Rufe hydro fighters with the R tail code of Kiyokawa Maru

Lae-Salamaua Strike, 10 March 1942 Enlargement of the picture of KIYOKAWA MARU (Japanese seaplane tender, 1937-1945), showing what appears to be a bomb hole aft. Note planes on deck-three Mitsubishi F1M2 (“Pete”) and one E8N2 (“Dave”). Taken by a VT-5 TBD-1, from the USS YORKTOWN (CV-5) air group. NH 95446

Kimikawa Maru, like her sister Kamikawa Maru, would take part in the Midway and Aleutian campaign in 1942-43. A line would be drawn through her name on Poseidon’s ledger in October 1944 after an encounter with the submarine USS Sawfish (SS-276) off Luzon’s Cape Bojeador.

KIMIKAWA MARU (Japanese Seaplane Tender) Photographed in April 1943, at Ominato Bay, Japan, with a load of “PETE” seaplanes aft. NH 73056

Kunikawa Maru would go on to live through a myriad of actions in the Solomons, including the Battle of Santa Cruz Island, and assorted convoy duties until she hit a mine off Balikpapan in March 1944 and was never the same again. She would be finished for good by an airstrike in May 1945 in that Borneo port.

Petes & Rufes on the beach somewhere in the South Pacific, possibly Tulagi Harbor in the Solomons, although I have seen this captioned elsewhere as being in the Marshall Islands. The foreground F1M2 has tail code “L2” of Kunikawa Maru

Another view of the same

By the end of the war, all of the K-Marus had been sunk and their planes either shot down, abandoned or otherwise captured.

Japanese Navy Type 0 Reconnaissance E13A ‘Jake’ at Imajuku, Kyushu Island 1945 

In all, the K-Maru carriers were an interesting concept, a quick and easy way to send a small expeditionary airwing to sea short of converting the ships to more proper escort carriers such as done by the Allies.

A very interesting postwar interrogation of CDR Kintaro Miura, Kamikawa Maru‘s senior air officer from the outbreak of war until December 1942, is in the NHHC archives.

Several scale models of these vessels and their aircraft are in circulation, as is their accompanying artwork, and they have sparked the imagination of warship fans the world over.

Mitsubishi F1M2 Pete floatplane by Robert Taylor. L2 Tail code indicates the plane belongs to the Kunikawa Maru a cargo ship converted to a seaplane tender

Specs:


Displacement: 6,863 tons standard
Length: 479 feet
Beam: 62 feet
Draft: 30 feet
Installed power: 7,600 shp
Propulsion: 1 Kawasaki-M. A. N. diesel, 1 shaft
Speed: 19.5 knots, 17 in military service
Armament: 2 x 5.9-inch, 2 x Type 96 25 mm (0.98 in) AA, 2 x 13.2 mm (0.52 in) MG
Aircraft carried: 12-18 seaplanes (24 stored)
Aviation facilities: Two catapults, cranes

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