USS Wasp World War II CV-7 Aircraft Carrier

USS Wasp World War II CV-7 Aircraft Carrier USS Wasp Overview Nation: United StatesType: Aircraft CarrierShipyard: Fore River ShipyardLaid Down: April 1, 1936Launched: April 4, 1939Commissioned: April 25, 1940Fate: Sunk September 15, 1942 Specifications Displacement: 19,423 tonsLength: 741 ft., 3 in.Beam: 109 ft.Draft: 20 ft.Propulsion: 2 Ãâ€" Parsons steam turbines, 6 Ãâ€" boilers at 565 psi, 2 Ãâ€" shaftsSpeed: 29.5 knotsRange: 14,000 nautical miles at 15 knotsComplement: 2,167 men Armament Guns 8 Ãâ€" 5 in./.38 cal guns16 Ãâ€" 1.1 in./.75 cal anti-aircraft guns 24 Ãâ€" .50 in. machine guns Aircraft up to 100 aircraft Design Construction In the wake of the 1922 Washington Naval Treaty, the worlds leading sea powers were restricted in the size and total tonnage of warships they were permitted to build and deploy. Under the treatys initial terms, the United States was allotted 135,000 for aircraft carriers. With the construction of USS Yorktown (CV-5) and USS Enterprise (CV-6), the US Navy found itself with 15,000 tons remaining in its allowance. Rather than permit this to go unused, they ordered a new carrier built that possessed approximately three-quarters the displacement of Enterprise. Though still a sizable ship, efforts were made to save weight to meet the treatys restrictions. As a result, the new ship, dubbed USS Wasp (CV-7), lacked much of its larger siblings armor and torpedo protection. Wasp also incorporated less powerful machinery which reduced the carriers displacement, but at a cost of around three knots of speed. Laid down at the Fore River Shipyard in Quincy, MA on April 1, 1936, Wasp was launched three years later on April 4, 1939. The first American carrier to possess a deck edge aircraft elevator, Wasp was commissioned on April 25, 1940, with Captain John W. Reeves in command. Prewar Service Departing Boston in June, Wasp conducted testing and carrier qualifications through the summer before finishing its last sea trials in September. Assigned to Carrier Division 3, in October 1940, Wasp embarked US Army Air Corps ,P-40 fighters for flight testing. These efforts showed that land-based fighters could fly from a carrier. Through the remainder of the year and into 1941, Wasp largely operated in the Caribbean where it participated in a variety of training exercises. Returning to Norfolk, VA in March, the carrier aided a sinking lumber schooner en route. While at Norfolk, Wasp was fitted with the new CXAM-1 radar. After a brief return to the Caribbean and service off Rhode Island, the carrier received orders to sail for Bermuda. With World War II raging, Wasp operated from Grassy Bay and conducted neutrality patrols in the western Atlantic Ocean. Returning to Norfolk in July, Wasp embarked US Army Air Forces fighters for delivery to Iceland. Delivering the aircraft on August 6, the carrier remained in the Atlantic conducting flight operations until arriving at Trinidad in early September. USS Wasp   Though the United States remained technically neutral, the US Navy was directed to destroy German and Italian warships that threatened Allied convoys. Aiding in convoy escort duties through the fall, Wasp was at Grassy Bay when news arrived of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor on December 7. With the United States formal entry into the conflict, Wasp conducted a patrol into the Caribbean before returning to Norfolk for a refit. Departing the yard on January 14, 1942, the carrier accidently collided with USS Stack forcing it to return to Norfolk. Sailing a week later, Wasp joined Task Force 39 en route to Britain. Arriving at Glasgow, the ship was tasked with ferrying Supermarine Spitfire fighters to the beleaguered island of Malta as part of Operation Calendar. Successfully delivering the aircraft in late April, Wasp carried another load of Spitfires to the island in May during Operation Bowery. For this second mission, it was accompanied by the carrier HMS Eagle. With the loss of USS Lexington at the Battle of the Coral Sea in early May, the US Navy decided to transfer Wasp to the Pacific to aid in combating the Japanese. World War II in the Pacific After a brief refit at Norfolk, Wasp sailed for the Panama Canal on May 31 with Captain Forrest Sherman in command. Pausing at San Diego, the carrier embarked an air group of F4F Wildcat fighters, SBD Dauntless dive bombers, and TBF Avenger torpedo bombers. In the wake of the victory at the Battle of Midway in early June, Allied forces elected to go on the offensive in early August by striking at Guadalcanal in the Solomon Islands. To aid this operation, Wasp sailed with Enterprise and USS Saratoga (CV-3) to provide air support for the invasion forces. As American troops went ashore on August 7, aircraft from Wasp struck targets around the Solomons including Tulagi, Gavutu, and Tanambogo. Attacking the seaplane base at Tanambogo, aviators from Wasp destroyed twenty-two Japanese aircraft. Fighters and bombers from Wasp continued to engage the enemy until late on August 8 when Vice Admiral Frank J. Fletcher ordered the carriers to withdraw. A controversial decision, it effectively stripped the invasion troops of their air cover. Later that month, Fletcher ordered Wasp south to refuel leading the carrier to miss the Battle of the Eastern Solomons. In the fighting, Enterprise was damaged leaving Wasp and USS Hornet (CV-8) as the US Navys only operational carriers in the Pacific. USS Wasp Sinking Mid-September found Wasp sailing with Hornet and the battleship USS North Carolina (BB-55) to provide an escort for transports carrying the 7th Marine Regiment to Guadalcanal. At 2:44 PM on September 15, Wasp was conducting flight operations when six torpedoes were spotted in the water. Fired by the Japanese submarine I-19, three struck Wasp despite the carrier turning hard to starboard. Lacking sufficient torpedo protection, the carrier took severe damage as all struck fuel tanks and ammunition supplies. Of the other three torpedoes, one hit the destroyer USS OBrien while another struck North Carolina. Aboard Wasp, the crew desperately attempted to control the spreading fires but damage to the ships water mains prevented them from having success. Additional explosions occurred twenty-four minutes after the attack making the situation worse. Seeing no alternative, Sherman ordered Wasp abandoned at 3:20 PM. The survivors were taken off by nearby destroyers and cruisers. In the course of the attack and attempts to fight the fires, 193 men were killed. A burning hulk, Wasp was finished off by torpedoes from the destroyer USS Lansdowne and sunk by the bow at 9:00 PM. Selected Sources DANFS: USS Wasp (CV-7)Military Factory: USS Wasp (CV-7)Hull Number: CV-7

GIS (Geographic Information Systems) in Everyday Life

GIS (Geographic Information Systems) in Everyday Life GIS According to Canalys there were approximately 41 million GPS units sold in 2008, and in 2009 the number of GPS enabled cell phones in use had exceeded 27 million. Without even thinking, tens of millions of people access directions and look-up local businesses from these hand-held devices every day. Lets tie this back to our big picture here, GIS. The 24 GPS satellites orbiting earth are constantly broadcasting data about their location and exact time. Your GPS device or phone receives and process the signals from three to four of these satellites to figure out where it is located. Points of interest, addresses (lines or points), and aerial or road data is all stored in a database that is accessed by your device. When you submit data, such as posting a geo-Tweet (a location-based Tweet on Twitter), checking in on Foursquare, or rating a restaurant you are adding data to one or more GIS data sources. Popular GIS Applications Traditionally desktop GIS has dominated the GIS mindset. People think of ArcMap, MicroStation, or other enterprise-level GIS applications when they think desktop GIS. But the most prevalent desktop GIS application is free, and quiet powerful. With over 400 million total downloads (according to GeoWeb 2008 keynote speech by Michael Jones) Google Earth is by far the most used GIS application in the world. While many people use Google Earth to look for fun things such as a friends house, crop circles, and other oddities, Google Earth also allows you to add georeferenced images, view parcel data, and find routes. Georeferencing Photos Even before the average computer user was using GIS on a near daily basis, everyone has benefited from it. The government uses GIS to decide voting districts, analyze demographics, and even time street lights. The real power of GIS is that it is more than a map, it is a map that can show us exactly what we want to see. How has GIS become such an integral part of society almost seamlessly? Google, Garmin, and others were not creating products with Hey, the mass public needs GIS in mind, no, they were meeting needs. Humans think geographically. Who, What, When, Where, Why, and How those are the five Ws right? Place is extremely important to people. When studying how human populations have acted over the past millennia it is easy to see how geography dictated culture. Today, place still dictates much of our lives: property values, crime rates, education standards, these can all be classified by place. It is interesting to see when a technology has become so ingrained in a society that people dont consider it when they use it, they just use it; like with cell phones, cars, microwaves, etc. (that list could be very long). Personally, as someone who loves maps and loves computers and works in the GIS field I think it is great that an eight-year-old has the ability to look-up their friends address and sho w their parents exactly where they are going, or for family members to be able to see pictures of those they love where they were taken, and so many more cool things that GIS allows us to do without thinking. Kyle Souza is a GIS professional from Texas. He operates TractBuilder and can be reached at kyle.souzatractbuilder.com.