USS Ranger (CV-4) Totally Explained

|Ship builder=Newport News Shipbuilding & Drydock Co. |Ship ordered=1 November 1930 |Ship laid down=26 September 1931 |Ship launched=25 February 1933 |Ship purchased= |Ship commissioned=4 June 1934 |Ship decommissioned=18 October 1946 |Ship in service= |Ship out of service= |Ship renamed= |Ship reclassified= |Ship captured= |Ship fate=Sold for scrap |Ship struck=29 October 1946 |Ship reinstated= |Ship homeport= |Ship displacement=As built
14,576 tons standard
17,577 tons full load |Ship length=730 feet (waterline)
769 feet (234.4 m) (overall) |Ship beam=80 feet (waterline)
109 feet 5 inches (33.4 m) (overall) |Ship draught=22 feet 4.875 inches (6.8 m) |Ship propulsion=6 × boilers
Steam turbines
2 × shafts
53,500 shp |Ship speed=29.25 knots |Ship range= at |Ship endurance= |Ship test depth= |Ship capacity= |Ship complement=2,148 officers and men (1941) |Ship time to activate= |Ship sensors= |Ship EW= |Ship armament=8 × single 5 inch 25 caliber guns
40 × .50 caliber machine guns |Ship armour=2 inch sides and bulkheads
1 inch top over steering gear |Ship aircraft=86 aircraft
3 × catapults |Ship motto= |Ship nickname= |Ship honours=American Defense Service Medal ("A" device) / American Campaign Medal/European-African-Middle Eastern Campaign Medal (2 stars) / Asiatic-Pacific Campaign Medal / World War II Victory Medal |}}
The sixth USS Ranger (CV-4) was the first ship of the United States Navy to be designed and built from the keel up as an aircraft carrier. Compared to later aircraft carriers, Ranger was a relatively small ship, closer to the preceding carrier, USS Langley in terms of tonnage. Initially it didn't even possess an island; although a small one was added after construction. The s which followed were over 10,000 tons larger and more capable, as were the s which followed them.
She was laid down 26 September 1931 by Newport News Shipbuilding & Drydock Co., Newport News, Virginia, launched 25 February 1933, sponsored by Lou Henry Hoover (wife of the President of the United States), and commissioned at the Norfolk Navy Yard 4 June 1934, Captain Arthur L. Bristol in command.

1934-1941

Ranger conducted her first air operations off Cape Henry on 6 August 1934 and departed Norfolk the 17th for a shakedown training cruise that took her to Rio de Janeiro, Buenos Aires, and Montevideo. She returned to Norfolk 4 October for operations off the Virginia Capes until 28 March 1935, when she sailed for the Pacific. Transiting the Panama Canal on 7 April, she arrived in San Diego on the 15th. For nearly 4 years she participated in fleet problems reaching to Hawaii, and in western seaboard operations that took her as far south as Callao, Peru, and as far north as Seattle, Washington. On 4 January 1939, she departed San Diego for winter fleet operations in the Caribbean based at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. She then steamed north to Norfolk, arriving 18 April. Ranger cruised along the eastern seaboard out of Norfolk and into the Caribbean Sea. In the fall of 1939, she commenced Neutrality Patrol operations, operating out of Bermuda along the trade routes of the middle Atlantic and up the eastern seaboard up to NS Argentia, Newfoundland.

World War II

1942

In December 1941 She was returning to Norfolk from an ocean patrol extending to Port of Spain, Trinidad and Tobago, when the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor. Arriving Norfolk 8 December, she sailed on the 21st for patrol in the South Atlantic. She then entered the Norfolk Navy Yard for repairs 22 March 1942. Ranger served as flagship of Rear Admiral A. B. Cook, Commander, Carriers, U.S. Atlantic Fleet, until 6 April 1942, when he was relieved by Rear Adm. Ernest D. McWhorter, who also broke his flag in Ranger.
   Steaming to Naval Air Station Quonset Point, Rhode Island, Ranger loaded 68 Army P-40 planes and men of the Army's 33rd Pursuit Squadron, put to sea 22 April, and launched the Army squadron 10 May to land at Accra, on the Gold Coast of Africa. She returned to Quonset Point 28 May 1942, made a patrol to Argentina, then stood out of Newport 1 July with another 72 Army P-40s, which she launched off the coast of Africa for Accra on the 19th. Both groups of P-40s were en route to relieve the Flying Tigers in China. After calling at Trinidad, she returned to Norfolk for local battle practice until 1 October, then based her training at Bermuda in company with four Sangamon-class escort aircraft carriers that had been newly converted from tankers to meet the need for naval air power in the Atlantic.
   The only large carrier in the Atlantic Fleet, Ranger led the task force comprising herself and four escort carriers that provided air superiority during the amphibious invasion of Vichy French Morocco on the morning of 8 November 1942.
   It was still dark at 0615 that day, when Ranger, stationed northwest of Casablanca, began launching her aircraft to support the landings made at three points on the Atlantic coast of North Africa (Operation Torch). Nine of her F4F Wildcats attacked the Rabat and Rabat-Sale aerodromes, headquarters of the French air forces in Morocco. Without loss to themselves, they destroyed seven planes on one field, and 14 bombers on the other. Another flight destroyed seven planes on the Port Lyautey field. Some of Ranger's planes strafed four French destroyers in Casablanca harbor while others strafed and bombed nearby batteries.
   The carrier launched 496 combat sorties in the 3-day operation. Her attack aircraft scored two direct bomb hits on the French destroyer leader Albatros, completely wrecking her forward half and causing 300 casualties. They also attacked the French cruiser Primauguet as she sortied from Casablanca Harbor, dropped depth charges within lethal distance of two submarines, and knocked out coastal defense and anti-aircraft batteries. They destroyed more than 70 enemy planes on the ground and shot down 15 in aerial combat. But 16 planes from Ranger were lost or damaged beyond repair. It was estimated that 21 light enemy tanks were immobilized and some 86 military vehicles destroyed - most of them troop-carrying trucks.
   Casablanca capitulated to the American forces 11 November 1942 and Ranger departed the Moroccan coast 12 November, returning to Norfolk, Virginia on the 23rd of November.

1943

Following training in Chesapeake Bay, the carrier underwent overhaul in the Norfolk Navy Yard from 16 December 1942 to 7 February 1943. She next transported 75 P-40-L Army pursuit planes to Africa, arriving Casablanca on 23 February; then patrolled and trained pilots along the New England coast steaming as far north as Halifax, Nova Scotia. Departing Halifax 11 August, she joined the British Home Fleet at Scapa Flow, Scotland, 19 August, and patrolled the approaches to the British Isles. Ranger departed Scapa Flow with the Home Fleet 2 October to attack German shipping in Norwegian waters (Operation Leader). The objective of the force was the Norwegian port of Bodø. The task force reached launch position off Vestfjord before dawn 4 October completely undetected. At 0618, Ranger launched 20 SBD Dauntless dive bombers and an escort of eight Wildcat fighters. One division of dive bombers attacked the 8,000-ton freighter LaPlata, while the rest continued north to attack a small German convoy. They severely damaged a 10,000-ton tanker and a smaller troop transport. They also sank two of four small German merchantmen in the Bodö roadstead.
A second Ranger attack group of 10 TBF Avengers and six Wildcats destroyed a German freighter and a small coaster and bombed yet another troop-laden transport. Three Ranger planes were lost to antiaircraft fire. On the afternoon of 4 October, Ranger was finally located by three German aircraft, but her combat air patrol shot down two of the enemy planes and chased off the third. Ranger returned to Scapa Flow 6 October 1943. She patrolled with the British Second Battle Squadron in waters reaching to Iceland, and then departed Hvalfjord on 26 November, arriving Boston 4 December.

1944

On 3 January 1944, she became a training carrier out of Quonset Point, Rhode Island. This duty was interrupted 20 April when she arrived at Staten Island, New York, to load 76 P-38 Lightning fighter planes together with Army, Navy, and French Naval personnel for transport to Casablanca. Sailing 24 April, she arrived Casablanca 4 May. There she onloaded Army aircraft destined for stateside repairs and embarked military passengers for the return to New York.
   Prior to her returning to the States, Chief of Naval Operations Admiral Ernest J. King looked very seriously at having Ranger lengthened and given new engines during her overhaul. As Ranger was designed in the late 1920s, she was smaller and slower than the rest of the US carrier fleet and couldn't carry as many aircraft. In addition her ammunition storage capability was far smaller than the other carriers, and she wasn't as well armored as the others, which would have been a serious problem had she been needed in the Pacific. King favored having the conversion done, but his staff pointed out that the resources needed to accomplish it would delay the completion and repair of newer, larger and more capable carriers. King therefore dropped the project.
   Touching at New York 16 May, Ranger then entered the Norfolk Navy Yard to have her flight deck strengthened and for installation of a new type catapult, radar, and associated gear that provided her with a capacity for night fighter interceptor training. On 11 July 1944 she departed Norfolk transited the Panama Canal 5 days later, and embarked several hundred Army passengers at Balboa for transportation to San Diego, arriving there 25 July.
   After embarking the men and aircraft of Night Fighting Squadron 102 and nearly a thousand marines, she sailed for Hawaiian waters 28 July, reaching Pearl Harbor 3 August. During the next 3 months she conducted night carrier training operations out of Pearl Harbor. Ranger departed Pearl Harbor 18 October to train pilots for combat duty. Operating out of San Diego under Commander, Fleet Air, Alameda, she continued training air groups and squadrons along the California coast throughout the remainder of the war. Ranger was the only carrier in existence prior to the start of the war which never engaged the Japanese in battle.

Final operations

Departing San Diego 30 September 1945, she embarked civilian and military passengers at Balboa and then steamed for New Orleans, Louisiana, arriving 18 October. Following Navy Day celebrations there, she sailed 30 October for brief operations at Pensacola, Florida. After calling at Norfolk, she entered the Philadelphia Naval Shipyard 18 November for overhaul. She remained on the eastern seaboard until decommissioned at the Norfolk Naval Shipyard 18 October 1946. Struck from the Naval Vessel Register 29 October 1946, she was sold for scrap to Sun Shipbuilding and Drydock Company, Chester, Pennsylvania, 28 January 1947. Ranger received two battle stars for World War II service.

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