USS Barataria (AVP-33) off Houghton, Washington, on 21 August 1944
| |
History | |
---|---|
United States | |
Name | USS Barataria |
Namesake | Barataria Bay on the coast of Louisiana |
Builder | Lake Washington Shipyard, Houghton, Washington |
Laid down | 19 April 1943 |
Launched | 2 October 1943 |
Sponsored by | Mrs. L. J. Stetcher |
Commissioned | 13 August 1944 |
Decommissioned | 24 July 1946 |
Stricken | 26 September 1966 |
Honors and awards | One battle star for World War II service |
Fate |
|
United States | |
Name | USCGC Barataria (WAVP-381) |
Namesake | Previous name retained |
Acquired |
|
Commissioned | 10 January 1949 |
Decommissioned | 29 August 1969 |
Reclassified | High endurance cutter, WHEC-381, 1 May 1966 |
Honors and awards |
|
Fate | Sold for scrapping October 1970 |
General characteristics (seaplane tender) | |
Class and type | Barnegat-class seaplane tender |
Displacement |
|
Length | 310 ft 9 in (94.72 m) |
Beam | 41 ft 2 in (12.55 m) |
Draft | 13 ft 6 in (4.11 m) (lim.) |
Installed power | 6,000 horsepower (4.48 megawatts) |
Propulsion | Diesel engines, two shafts |
Speed | 18.2 knots (33.7 km/h)s |
Complement |
|
Sensors and processing systems | Radar; sonar |
Armament |
|
Aviation facilities | Supplies, spare parts, repairs, and berthing for one seaplane squadron; 80,000 US gallons (300,000 L) aviation fuel |
General characteristics (Coast Guard Cutter) | |
Class and type | Casco-class cutter |
Displacement | In 1966: 1,786 tons light; 2,522.4 tons (full load) |
Length | 310 ft 9 in (94.72 m) overall; 300 ft 0 in (91.44 m) between perpendiculars |
Beam | 41 ft 2.375 in (12.55713 m) maximum |
Draft | 13 ft 1 in (3.99 m) maximum in 1964 |
Installed power | 6,000 bhp (4,500 kW) |
Propulsion | Fairbanks-Morse direct-reversing diesel engines, two shafts; 166,430 US gallons (630,000 L) of fuel |
Speed |
|
Range |
|
Complement | In 1966: 151 (10 officers, 3 warrant officers, 138 enlisted personnel) |
Sensors and processing systems | |
Armament |
|
The second USS Barataria (AVP-33) was a United States Navy Barnegat-class seaplane tender in commission from 1944 to 1946. She saw service in the later stages of World War II and was decommissioned postwar. She then was transferred to the United States Coast Guard and was in commission as the Coast Guard cutter USCGC Barataria (WAVP-381), later WHEC-381 from 1949 to 1969, serving in the Cuban Missile Crisis and the Vietnam War during her lengthy Coast Guard career.
Barataria was laid down on 19 April 1943 at Houghton, Washington, by the Lake Washington Shipyard. She was launched on 2 October 1943, sponsored by Mrs. L. J. Stetcher, and commissioned at her builder's yard on 13 August 1944.
After having spent the remainder of August 1944 in outfitting, loading supplies, and testing and calibrating equipment, Barataria conducted training in tending seaplanes under the auspices of Fleet Air Wing (FAW) 6 at Naval Air Station Whidbey Island at Oak Harbor, Washington. Concluding that training in early September 1944, the ship spent 10 September 1944 through 10 October 1944 in gunnery exercises, casualty drills, sonar training, a speed run, combat information center exercises, and in more seaplane tending operations. Upon completion of the shakedown, she returned to the Puget Sound Navy Yard at Bremerton, Washington, for post-shakedown availability and alterations.
Barnegat-class ships were very reliable and seaworthy and had good habitability, and the United States Coast Guard viewed them as ideal for ocean station duty, in which they would perform weather reporting and search and rescue tasks, once they were modified by having a balloon shelter added aft and having oceanographic equipment, an oceanographic winch, and a hydrographic winch installed. After World War II, the Navy transferred 18 of the ships to the Coast Guard, in which they were known as the Casco-class cutters.
After she been inactive for more than two years, the U.S. Navy loaned Barataria to the Coast Guard on 17 September 1948. After undergoing conversion for use as a weather-reporting ship, she was commissioned into Coast Guard service as USCGC Barataria (WAVP-381) on 10 January 1949.
Barataria was stationed at Portland, Maine, on 1 August 1949, and it would remain her home port until January 1968. Her primary duty was to serve on ocean stations to gather meteorological data. While on duty in one of these stations, she was required to patrol a 210-square-mile (544-square-kilometer) area for three weeks at a time, leaving the area only when physically relieved by another Coast Guard cutter or in the case of a dire emergency. While on station, she acted as an aircraft check point at the point of no return, a relay point for messages from ships and aircraft, as a source of the latest weather information for passing aircraft, as a floating oceanographic laboratory, and as a search-and-rescue ship for downed aircraft and vessels in distress, and she engaged in law enforcement operations.
Barataria patrolled the America's Cup Race at Newport, Rhode Island, in September 1962.
When the Cuban Missile Crisis began in October 1962, Barataria was conducting an ocean station patrol on Ocean Station Echo in the shipping lanes east of Cuba. Barataria made contact with a Soviet freighter transporting a cargo of ballistic missiles and was ordered to shadow the freighter and await the arrival of a U.S. Navy warship which would conduct a boarding of the Soviet ship. Barataria remained at battle stations, Condition 2, and repeatedly attempted to establish communications with the Soviet ship. All attempts failed. A U.S. Navy destroyer based at Norfolk, Virginia, arrived and the Navy crew boarded the Soviet vessel.
Barataria won the Commander Eastern Area Gunnery Excellence Award in 1963 and the Military Readiness Award in 1965. On 1 May 1966 she was reclassified as a high endurance cutter and redesignated WHEC-381. On 26 September 1966 her period on loan to the Coast Guard ended when she was stricken from the Naval Vessel Register and transferred permanently to the Coast Guard.
On 1 April 1967, Barataria departed Portland, Maine, and moved to Pearl Harbor, Hawaii. There she joined four other Casco-class Coast Guard cutters - USCGC Gresham, USCGC Yakutat, USCGC Bering Strait and USCGC Half Moon in forming Coast Guard Squadron Three. All five cutters were former Barnegat-class ships. Gresham became flagship of the squadron, which was designated Task Unit 70.8.6. Captain John E. Day, commander of the squadron, hoisted his pennant aboard Gresham upon activation of the squadron at Pearl Harbor on 24 April 1967.
Coast Guard Squadron Three was tasked to operate in conjunction with U.S. Navy forces in Operation Market Time, the interdiction of North Vietnamese coastal arms and munitions traffic along the coastline of South Vietnam during the Vietnam War. The squadron's other Vietnam War duties included naval gun fire support for ground forces, resupplying Coast Guard and Navy patrol boats and search-and-rescue operations. The cutters departed Pearl Harbor on 26 April 1967 and reported to Commander, United States Seventh Fleet, for Market Time duty on 4 May 1967. They were joined by Navy radar picket destroyer escorts (DERs) of Escort Squadrons 5 and 7.
The ten Market Time ships arrived at Subic Bay in the Philippines on 10 May 1967. The five Coast Guard cutters and five Navy destroyer escorts continuously manned four Market Time stations off Vietnam, while only Navy warships served on two Taiwan patrol stations. One ship rotated duty as the station ship in Hong Kong.
During her Vietnam War tour, Barataria was underway 83 percent of the time and cruised over 67,000 nautical miles (124,000 km) without a major mechanical or electrical failure. Keeping a close watch on all moving craft in her surveillance area, Barataria detected, inspected, or boarded nearly 1,000 steel-hulled vessels traversing her area, any one of which could have been a trawler trying to sneak supplies to the enemy.
Barataria was called upon many times to use her main battery against enemy troops ashore who were engaged with allied forces; United States Army spotter planes reported all of Barataria's rounds on target, never once falling out of the target area. On one gunfire support mission, Barataria scored three direct hits on point targets which had been spotted by aircraft.
Barataria returned to the United States on 12 January 1968 and was reassigned to San Francisco, California, which was her home port for the remainder of her Coast Guard career. She was used for law enforcement and search and rescue duties in the Pacific Ocean.
On 24 March 1968, Barataria sustained an engine-room explosion off Unimak Island in Alaska's Aleutian Islands.
From 21 May 1969 to 27 May 1969, Barataria rescued the crew of and stood by the Peruvian merchant ship Yavari 960 nautical miles (1,780 km) southwest of San Francisco. Yavari sank before a salvage tug could arrive.
The Coast Guard decommissioned Barataria on 29 August 1969. She was sold for scrapping in October 1970 to N.W. Kennedy Ltd. of Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada.
During her career, Barataria earned the following awards:[2]