USS Noma (SP-131)
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History | |
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United States | |
Name |
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Owner |
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Port of registry | New York |
Builder | Burlee Dry Dock Company of Staten Island, New York |
Yard number | 235 |
Launched | 11 February 1902 |
History | |
United States | |
Name | USS Noma |
Acquired | May 1917 |
Commissioned | 10 May 1917 |
Decommissioned | mid-July 1919 |
Fate | Returned to owner 15 July 1919 |
History | |
Italy | |
Name | Salvatore Primo |
Owner |
|
Port of registry | Trieste |
Acquired | 1933 |
Fate | Sunk by aircraft torpedo 21 June 1943 |
General characteristics | |
Type | Yacht |
Tonnage | 763 GRT |
Displacement | 1250 tons |
Length | 262 ft 6 in (80.01 m) |
Beam | 28 ft 6 in (8.69 m) |
Draft | 15 ft 6 in (4.72 m) |
Installed power | Two triple expansion steam engines |
Propulsion | Twin screws |
Speed | 19 kn (35 km/h; 22 mph) |
Complement | 80 |
Armament |
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USS Noma (SP-131) was the private steam yacht Noma, built in 1902 on Staten Island and loaned to the U.S. Navy during World War I as a patrol craft assigned to protect shipping from German submarines. At war’s end she served the American Relief Commission in Constantinople and the Black Sea before being returned to her owner after decommissioning. In the 1930s she was converted to a salvage tug, owned in Italy as Salvatore Primo, and torpedoed during World War II.
Noma was a large steam yacht, designed by Tams, Lemoine & Crane and built by the Burlee Dry Dock Co. of Staten Island, New York, Yard No. 235, and launched on 11 February 1902.[1][2][3] She was built for William Bateman Leeds, the "Tin Plate King", who had married Nonnie May Stewart Worthington in 1900 and the following year sold his tin-plate business to US Steel for $40 million.[4]
The yacht measured 763 GRT when built, with a lengths of 70.2 metres (230.3 ft)(pp) and 80.0 metres (262.5 ft)(oa), a beam of 8.7 metres (28.5 ft), and a draught of 4.7 metres (15.4 ft). Noma's two 4-cylinder triple expansion steam engines, also made by Burlee Dry Dock, totalled 518 nhp, drove twin screws and gave her a speed of 19 knots.[3][5]
Leeds died in 1908 and in 1911 Noma was bought by John Jacob Astor IV, though his ownership was short-lived as he died in the sinking of Titanic the following year, and the yacht passed to his son, Vincent Astor.[3][6]
After Noma's return to Vincent Astor he sold her to the department store magnate Rodman Wanamaker and by early 1920 she was being extensively overhauled and improved at South Brooklyn, again supervised by Tams, Lemoine & Crane.[1] In 1923 Noma was chartered to William Beebe for his first expedition to the Galápagos Islands.[7] In about 1927, Noma was sold to Nelson B. Warden and renamed Vega.[3]
In 1933 Vega was sold to Wilhelm Schuchmann of Hamburg, owner of the German towage and salvage company Bugsier Reederei-u. Bergungs AG, for conversion to a salvage tug.[3][5] Later that year she was sold to the Trieste-based company Unione Italiana di Salvataggio, in which Bugsier had a 25% holding, then renamed Salvatore Primo and stationed at Messina.[8][9][10]
Requisitioned by the Italian Navy in May 1940, Salvatore Primo was sunk at Palermo on 24 May 1941 by Royal Air Force bombing. She was raised by the Italians, repaired and returned to service.[10] On 21 June 1943, on passage between Gaeta and Sardinia she was again attacked by British planes and sunk with a torpedo about 25 nautical miles (46 km) north-northeast of Capo Figari, Sardinia.[3][11]