Tag Archives: USS Aries (PHM-5)

Aries Got her Gun (back)

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We’ve always been fans of the six-pack of Pegasus-class hydrofoil patrol missile (PHM) boats that entered service in 1977, were sadly underutilized during the Cold War, and were retired wholesale when it ended.

Each carried eight Harpoons, a 76mm/62c MK75 OTO Melara Super Rapid forward, and a GE LM2500 gas turbine that could drive the whole enterprise at 48 knots.

These 133-foot “Boeing boats” were magic to behold.

Pegasus on trials

USS Hercules (PHM-2) and Taurus (PHM-3) 1983

Hydrofoil USS Hercules PHM-2 Squadron 2 in Key West DN-SC-90-09332

The plan was that the Navy was to build over 30 of these little boats to operate in a couple of forward-deployed squadrons, with Italy, Germany, and possibly Japan to follow, but as soon as PHM champion Elmo Zumwalt left the CNO’s office, that plan went right out the window and just six were completed– although Japan and Italy did build some even smaller (75-foot) Sparviero/1-go boats, still with the Otobreda 76 forward but with half as many missiles.

Sent out to the scrappers in 1993, only one survives: ex-USS Aries (PHM-5), preserved as a memorial on the Gasconade River in Missouri.

The Aries PHM museum was stripped of almost everything that made her such a fetching design, but recently got a distinctive MK 92 FCS “egg” dome to go back on her pilothouse and, finally, a deactivated MK 75 mount.

The Ordnance Shop at the U.S. Coast Guard Yard, which inherited the MK75 program from the Navy in 2015 when the last FFG-7 retired, recently released a precious OTO mount, #135, to Aries.

No. 135 is unique, as its gun house had been ported and windows installed so that it could be used as a training aid at Coast Guard Training Center Yorktown, but with the service getting rid of the last of its MK75s as the old 270-foot Famous (Bear) class cutters go through a SLEP and get a smaller (MK38) mount, it wasn’t needed anymore and, incredibly, it is the same early OTO-made mount (not FMC) that came from Aries in 1993.

“We are delighted to know that the gun itself was original to the USS Aries,” noted the museum. “After all these years, they have been reunited due to the efforts of the Coast Guard Ordnance Yard in Baltimore, MD. We are so grateful for the contributions of all involved.”

Bravo Zulu, folks.

Now to get her some surplus Harpoon cans —maybe off a laid-up Tico before they are all sunk or scrapped.

Surely some dewatted Harpoon cans can be unbolted from these old girls and live on aboard Aries…

USS High Point hits her lowest point

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NHHC L45-125.04.01

A few years ago, we covered the story of the experimental 115-foot “hydrofoil sub chaser” USS High Point (PCH-1) being up for sale in poor condition in Astoria, Oregon.

Built by Boeing in 1962, she was the first of a series of hydrofoil craft designed to evaluate the performance of this kind of propulsion in the modern Navy, one that ultimately led to the design (by Boeing) of the Pegasus-class patrol combatant missile hydrofoils, or PHMs.

Decommissioned by the Navy in March 1975 after a decade of testing, High Point was used briefly by the Coast Guard until her main turbine exploded, then was stricken in 1980.

428-GX-K108129 Patrol Craft, Hydrofoil, USS High Point (PCH-1) underway during a search and rescue exercise off San Francisco by JOC(AC) Warren Grass, 25 April 1975

428-GX-K108129 Patrol Craft, Hydrofoil, USS High Point (PCH-1) underway during a search and rescue exercise off San Francisco by JOC(AC) Warren Grass, 25 April 1975

Powered just by her auxiliary Detriot Diesel, she was retained as a non-commissioned experimental hulk until finally disposed of by MARAD in 1991. She passed through a series of private owners until she came up for sale once again for $70,000– with no takers.

Now, as detailed by Scotty Sam Silverman over at the Museumships group, she met her end earlier this month.

Silverman’s photos: 

All is not totally lost as a number of relics from the vessel were apparently passed on to a local, free cannery museum on the condition they set up and display the foil propeller.

A Requiem for a Ship that Could Fly;
A Ship of local notoriety,
USS HIGH POINT PCH-1

There were no flags flying, no bands playing on the pier, no dress uniforms with gold braids waiting to congratulate the captain and crew for a successful mission. No, there was none of that. Only an excavator with a hydraulic crusher awaited. And over a period of four days, in the middle of August, this once proud foilborne warrior was reduced to a heap of scrap and hauled away.

She deserved better, but you can’t save them all.

The only American “fighting foil” left afloat is the ex-USS Aries (PHM-5) museum in Gasconade, Missouri. Please pay them a visit or at least throw them a few dollars.

Aries may soon ride again

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Back in the 1970s Adm. Elmo Zumwalt came up with the idea that flotillas of small, fast attack craft could help control the coastal littoral in time of war. Used in places like the Baltic and Scandinavian, they could blunt potential Soviet Red Banner fleet amphibious operations if the balloon went up.

The only outcome of this was the six pack of Pegasus-class hydrofoils. Termed “PHM” (Patrol, Hydrofoil, Missile) these stubby 133-foot craft could zip at 51-knots when wide open and, using a Mk 92 fire control system, fire off eight Harpoons and a Mk 75 76mm OTO Melara main gun with a crew of just 21 men (skippered by a LCDR!).

USS Aries (PHM-5) back in her fighting trim

USS Aries (PHM-5) back in her fighting trim

The PHMs were home-ported in Key West, Fla. as Patrol Combatant Missile Hydrofoil Squadron TWO, but were decommissioned as a class on 30 July 1993 after just a decade of service that included a lot of USCG missions and regular UNITAS exercises among others.

The Boeing-built craft were all named after Greek mythological figures: USS Pegasus (PHM 1), USS Hercules (PHM 2), USS Taurus (PHM 3), USS Aquila (PHM 4), USS Aries (PHM-5) and USS Gemini (PHM-6).

Bought back in 1996 for $20,000, sans armament and most of her neat-o gear but still with her propulsion and hydrofoils still largely intact, ex-Aries is the only one of her class saved from the scrapper as a museum ship in Missouri.

Aries at Gasconade Shipyard, looking very neutered (via Waterways Journal)

Aries as she appears today at Gasconade Shipyard, looking very neutered (via Waterways Journal)

Now, after a 20-year saga, the last U.S. Navy PHM will soon be used as both a museum ship and training vessel for The Maritime Academy of Toledo as well as the Ohio Naval Militia.

From Waterways Journal:

After spending 18 years docked on the Grand River at Brunswick, Mo., the former Navy hydrofoil USS Aries is slowly coming back to life.

A group of volunteers from the Ohio Navy and the barge industry have been working on the Cold War naval ship since last November at the Gasconade (Mo.) Shipyard, restoring it for future use as a 21st century maritime training vessel.

The Aries remains tied off at the shipyard at the mouth of the Gasconade River, just up from the wine-laden town of Hermann, Mo., until May 2017, when it is hoped that the ship can be moved under its own power to Cairo, Ill., for drydocking. The Aries would then travel north on the Ohio River to Hebron, Ky., in June for final renovations.

The Rev. Kempton D. Baldridge, chaplain for the Ohio River Region with the Seamen’s Church Institute (SCI), Paducah, Ky., said a week-long cadet orientation will likely take place onboard in late July, with a recommissioning ceremony tentatively scheduled for July 30 in Cincinnati, Ohio. Baldridge, who briefly served on the Aries and its five sister ships in the ‘80s as a Navy Reserve chaplain, has helped the Ohio Navy—an organized, all-volunteer unit that has been serving the State of Ohio and the nation since 1896—rehab the vessel by making connections in the marine industry, raising funds and lending a physical hand during the process.

“The day after Aries observes its recommissioning, the vessel will help commemorate the 120th anniversary of the first Ohio Navy training cruise, with a two-week, 902-mile river circuit from Cincinnati to East Liverpool, Ohio, and return,” said Baldridge. “Aries’ crew, which will include a dozen or so maritime cadets, would transit all nine of Ohio’s locks and dams twice, once northbound and once southbound. At least that’s the plan as it stands now.”

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