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DEPARTMENT OF THE NAVY -- NAVAL HISTORICAL CENTER
805 KIDDER BREESE SE -- WASHINGTON NAVY YARD
WASHINGTON DC 20374-5060
Photo # NH 98764:  SS Abangarez at San Francisco in late 1945 or early 1946

Online Library of Selected Images:
-- CIVILIAN SHIPS --

Abangarez (British and American Passenger and cargo ship, 1909).

SS Abangarez, the third of thirteen 5,000 gross ton banana carriers built between 1908 and 1911 for the United Fruit Company, was completed in Ireland in 1909 and entered service on the company's Costa Rica line, connecting New Orleans with ports in Panama and Costa Rica. On the outbreak of war in 1914 she was transferred from British to United States registry. After U. S. entry into the war she was requisitioned by the Shipping Board and served as a troopship under Navy control (but not as a Navy ship) in 1918. She passed into Army service in January 1919, was released from requisition at the beginning of March, and sailed on her first postwar voyage for United Fruit in April.

Abangarez made the news on 28 October 1923 when she collided with the U.S. Navy submarine O-5 as the submarine entered Limon Bay preparatory to transiting the Panama Canal. The merchant ship was little damaged, but the submarine sank in less than a minute with the loss of three men. A lengthy legal proceeding resulted in a finding that Abangarez had not been at fault. She was cut down to a freighter when new safety regulations took effect in 1937, losing the middle deck of her superstructure.

Allocated to the Army by the War Shipping Administration in 1942, Abangarez served throughout World War II carrying cargo across the Atlantic. United Fruit transferred ownership of the old ship to the Maritime Commission in January 1946 as part payment for new ships but the War Shipping Administration used her for three voyages from San Francisco in 1946: to Korea in March, to Yokohama in June, and to Honolulu later in the year. Returning to San Francisco in December, she was sold for scrap in April 1947.

This page features the only view we have concerning S.S. Abangarez of 1909.


If you want higher resolution reproductions than the digital images presented here, see: "How to Obtain Photographic Reproductions."

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Photo #: NH 98764

SS Abangarez


In San Francisco Bay, California, in late 1945 or early 1946.
This United Fruit Company banana carrier was built in Ireland in 1909.

Donation of Boatswain's Mate First Class Robert G. Tippins, USN (Retired), 2003.

U.S. Naval Historical Center Photograph.

Online Image: 76KB; 740 x 545 pixels

 


If you want higher resolution reproductions than the digital images presented here, see: "How to Obtain Photographic Reproductions."


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Page made 21 August 2005