The success of the Independence class carriers produced two more similar ships, intended to offset expected wartime attrition. That would keep the number of small aircraft carriers at nine, allowing one to serve in a team with two larger units of the Essex and Ticonderoga classes. Built from the first as aircraft carriers, the new carriers' design was based on the hull and machinery of the 13,600 ton Baltimore class heavy cruisers, allowing better hull subdivision, improved protection, greater magazine volume, a stronger flight deck, expanded air group and slightly higher speed than in the Independence class.
Built in just two years, the first of the new small carriers, Saipan, was completed eleven months after World War II's end. She and her sister, USS Wright, served continuously through the later 1940s and into the mid-1950s, both as training carriers and in combat roles with air groups for either anti-submarine warfare or close-air support of ground forces.
When the larger Essex/Ticonderoga class carriers became available for those jobs, the less-capable Saipans were pushed into reserve and reclassified as aircraft transports. However, in the early 1960s these still relatively new ships were heavily modified for a new mission, providing seagoing command facilities for the Nation's leaders in the event of a Nuclear crisis. Wright was commissioned for that role in 1963. Saipan's command ship conversion was cancelled, but she was reconfigured as a communications relay ship, reentering service as USS Arlington in 1966. The ships' new tasks were soon overtaken by new technologies, with the emergency command function going aloft in specially-configured large transport aircraft, while Earth orbiting satellites absorbed the communications relay function. Both of the former Saipan class carriers were decommissioned for the last time in 1970.
The two ships of the Saipan class were both built
at the New York Shipbuilding Coporation shipyard, Camden, New
Jersey. Individual ships' construction data follows:
Saipan class "as-built" design characteristics:
This page features limited pictorial coverage of Saipan class small aircraft carriers, with links to pages concerning individual ships.
For coverage of other classes of U.S. Navy fleet aircraft carriers, see: Fleet Aircraft Carriers -- Overview and Special Image Selection.
If you want higher resolution reproductions than the digital images presented here, see: "How to Obtain Photographic Reproductions." |
Click on the small photograph to prompt a larger view of the same image.
For more views of Saipan class small aircraft carriers,
see:
For coverage of other classes of U.S. Navy fleet aircraft carriers, see: Fleet Aircraft Carriers -- Overview and Special Image Selection.
If you want higher resolution reproductions than the digital images presented here, see: "How to Obtain Photographic Reproductions." |
Page made 27 October 2001