USS Yakutat (AVP-32) on 30 March 1944
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History | |
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United States | |
Name | USS Yakutat (AVP-32) |
Namesake | Yakutat Bay on the southern coast of Alaska |
Builder | Associated Shipbuilders, Inc., Seattle, Washington |
Laid down | 1 April 1942 |
Launched | 2 July 1943 |
Sponsored by | Mrs. Peter Barber |
Commissioned | 31 March 1944 |
Decommissioned | 17 April 1946 |
Nickname(s) |
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Honors and awards | Four battle stars for World War II service |
Fate | Loaned to U.S. Coast Guard 31 August 1948; permanently transferred to Coast Guard 26 September 1966 |
Acquired | Transferred from U.S. Coast Guard 1 January 1971[a] |
Fate | Transferred to South Vietnam 10 January 1971[b] |
United States | |
Name | USCGC Yakutat (WAVP-380) |
Namesake | Previous name retained |
Acquired |
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Commissioned | 23 November 1948 |
Reclassified | High endurance cutter (WHEC-380) 1 May 1966 |
Decommissioned | 1 January 1971[c] |
Honors and awards |
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Fate | Transferred to U.S. Navy 1 January 1971[a] |
South Vietnam | |
Name | RVNS Trần Nhật Duật (HQ-03) |
Namesake | Trần Nhật Duật (1255–1330), a general of the Trần dynasty |
Acquired | 10 January 1971 |
Fate |
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Philippines | |
Acquired | 5 April 1976 |
Commissioned | never |
Fate |
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General characteristics (seaplane tender) | |
Class and type | Barnegat-class small seaplane tender |
Displacement |
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Length | 311 ft 8 in (95.00 m) |
Beam | 41 ft 1 in (12.52 m) |
Draft | 13 ft 6 in (4.11 m) |
Installed power | 6,000 horsepower (4.48 megawatts) |
Propulsion | Diesel engines, two shafts |
Speed | 18.6 knots (34.4 km/h) |
Complement |
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Sensors and processing systems | Radar; sonar |
Armament |
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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 | 2,529 tons (full load) in 1966 |
Length | 310 ft 9.25 in (94.7230 m) overall; 300 ft 0 in (91.44 m) between perpendiculars |
Beam | 41 ft 0 in (12.50 m) maximum |
Draft | 12 ft 11 in (3.94 m) at full load in 1966 |
Installed power | 6,400 bhp (4,800 kW) |
Propulsion | Fairbanks-Morse geared diesel engines, two shafts; 165,625 US gallons (626,960 L) of fuel |
Speed |
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Range |
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Complement | 151 (10 officers, 3 warrant officers, 138 enlisted personnel) in 1966 |
Sensors and processing systems | |
Armament | In 1966: 1 x single 5-inch (127 mm) 38-caliber Mark 12-1 gun mount; 1 x Mark 10-1 antisubmarine projector; 2 x Mark 32 Mod 2 torpedo launchers with 3 torpedo tubes each) |
General characteristics (South Vietnamese frigate) | |
Class and type | Trần Quang Khải-class frigate |
Displacement |
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Length | 310 ft 9 in (94.72 m) (overall); 300 ft 0 in (91.44 m) waterline |
Beam | 41 ft 1 in (12.52 m) |
Draft | 13 ft 5 in (4.09 m) |
Installed power | 6,080 horsepower (4.54 megawatts) |
Propulsion | 2 x Fairbanks Morse 38D diesel engines |
Speed | approximately 18 knots (maximum) |
Complement | approximately 200 |
Armament |
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USS Yakutat (AVP-32) was a United States Navy Barnegat-class small seaplane tender in commission from 1944 to 1946. Yakutat tended seaplanes in combat areas in the Pacific during the latter stages of World War II. After the war, she was in commission in the United States Coast Guard from 1948 to 1971 as the Coast Guard cutter USCGC Yakutat (WAVP-380), later WHEC-380, seeing service in the Vietnam War during her Coast Guard career. Transferred to South Vietnam in 1971, she was commissioned into the Republic of Vietnam Navy as the frigate RVNS Trần Nhật Duật (HQ-03). When South Vietnam collapsed in 1975 at the end of the Vietnam War, she fled to the Philippines, where the Philippine Navy took custody of her and cannibalized her for spare parts until discarding her in 1982.
Yakutat (AVP-32) was laid down on 1 April 1942 at Seattle, Washington by Associated Shipbuilders, Inc. She was launched on 2 July 1942, sponsored by Mrs. Peter Barber, a mother who had lost three sons when the battleship USS Oklahoma (BB-37) was sunk on 7 December 1941 in the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, and was commissioned on 31 March 1944.[1]
Barnegat-class ships were very reliable and seaworthy and had good habitability. The 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 U.S. Navy transferred 18 of the ships to the Coast Guard, in which they were known as the Casco-class cutters.
The Navy loaned Yakutat to the Coast Guard on 31 August 1948. In September 1948, she was towed to the Hunters Point Naval Shipyard in San Francisco, California,[1] where she underwent conversion for service as a weather-reporting ship.[citation needed] The Coast Guard commissioned her as USCGC Yakutat (WAVP-380) at San Francisco on 23 November 1948.[1]
Proceeding from San Francisco via the Panama Canal and Kingston, Jamaica, Yakutat eventually commenced ocean station patrol duties in the North Atlantic Ocean, based at Portland, Maine, in late January 1949. Her primary duty was 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.
Yakutat shifted her home port to New Bedford, Massachusetts, later in 1949, and operated out of New Bedford until 1971, continuing her ocean station patrols. Periodically, she conducted naval refresher training in company with U.S. Navy ships out of Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.[1]
In February 1952, Yakutat proceeded to the scene of an unusual maritime disaster that occurred off Cape Cod, Massachusetts. Two commercial tankers – SS Fort Mercer and SS Pendleton – each broke in two and sank almost simultaneously. Yakutat, as the ship in tactical command of the rescue efforts, consequently picked up men from both ships and directed the rescue efforts of other participating vessels in the vicinity.[1] Members of her crew were awarded one gold and five silver Lifesaving Medals for their achievements in this rescue operation. The Finest Hours a 2016 film was made about the rescue operations.[7][8][9][10]
In December 1952, Yakutat rescued survivors of a plane crash off the entrance to St. George's Harbor, Bermuda, with her small boats.[1]
On 14 September 1953, Yakutat performed emergency repairs by constructing a concrete bulkhead aboard and pumping the bilges of the Spanish merchant ship Marte, which had a large hole at the waterline, about 750 nautical miles (1,390 km) southeast of Naval Station Argentia, Newfoundland, Canada.
In the autumn of 1955, Yakutat assisted the Portuguese fishing vessel Jose Alberto.
Yakutat assisted the damaged Liberian merchant ship Bordabere 400 nautical miles (740 km) south of Cape Race, Newfoundland, between 27 April 1965 and 3 May 1965. Yakutat's crew shored up Bordabere, pumped out seawater that had flooded her, and escorted her to Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada.
In late November 1965, Yakutat assisted the American merchant ships American Pilot and Maumee Sun after they collided west of the Cape Cod Canal.
Yakutat was reclassified as a high endurance cutter and redesignated WHEC-380 on 1 May 1966. On 26 September 1966, her Navy loan to the Coast Guard came to an end and she was transferred permanently from the Navy to the Coast Guard.
In 1967, Yakutat was assigned to Coast Guard Squadron Three, which was designated Task Unit 70.8.6. The squadron was activated at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, on 24 April 1967 when its commander, Captain John E. Day, hoisted his pennant aboard his flagship, the Coast Guard cutter USCGC Gresham.
Coast Guard Squadron Three was tasked to operate, in conjunction with U.S. Navy forces, in Operation Market Time, the interdiction of North Vietnamese arms and munitions traffic along the coastline of South Vietnam during the Vietnam War. The squadron's other Vietnam War duties included fire support for ground forces, resupplying Coast Guard and Navy patrol boats, and search-and-rescue operations. Serving in the squadron with Gresham and Yakutat were the cutters USCGC Bering Strait, USCGC Barataria and USCGC Half Moon; like Yakutat and Gresham, they all were former Navy Barnegat-class ships. They 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. Yakutat remained in the Western Pacific until 1 January 1968, then returned to the United States.
Yakutat earned two campaign stars during this Vietnam War tour, for:
Yakutat returned to her routine North Atlantic duties out of New Bedford in 1968. On 28 February 1969 she suffered minor damage when the fishing vessel Seafreeze Atlantic collided with her while docking at New Bedford.
In 1970, Yakutat was reassigned to Coast Guard Squadron Three for a second tour of duty in Vietnam, and resumed her Operation Market Time duties on 17 May 1970. She completed her tour on 31 December 1970.
Yakutat earned two more campaign stars during this Vietnam War tour, for:
Yakutat also received a Navy Unit Commendation and a Meritorious Unit Commendation during her Coast Guard career.[1]
The Coast Guard decommissioned Yakutat on 1 January 1971 in South Vietnam and transferred her to the U.S. Navy.[e]
The United States formally transferred Trần Nhật Duật to the Philippines on 5 April 1976. She did not enter Philippine Navy service; instead she and her sister ship RVNS Trần Quốc Toản (HQ-06) were cannibalized for spare parts to allow the Philippines to keep four other sister ships in commission in the Philippine Navy, in which they were known as the Andrés Bonifacio-class frigates.[2]
The former Trần Nhật Duật was discarded in 1982 and probably scrapped.[3]