Fletcher Class Destroyer
USS Fletcher in her original layout, 1942. |
|
| Class overview | |
|---|---|
| Name: | Fletcher-class destroyer |
| Operators: | United States Navy Argentine Navy Brazilian Navy Chilean Navy Colombian Navy Hellenic Navy Italian Navy JMSDF Mexican Navy Peruvian Navy ROKN Spanish Navy ROCN Turkish Navy West German Navy |
| Preceded by: | Gleaves class destroyer |
| Succeeded by: | Allen M. Sumner class destroyer |
| Built: | 3 March 1941 to 22 February 1945 |
| In commission: | 4 June 1942 to 1971 (USN), 2001 (Mexico) |
| Completed: | 175 |
| Lost: | 19 and 6 not repaired |
| Preserved: | 4 USS Cassin Young USS The Sullivans USS Kidd HNS Velos |
| General characteristics | |
| Type: | Destroyer |
| Displacement: | 2,050 tons (standard); 2,500 tons (full load) |
| Length: | 376.5 ft (114.8 m) |
| Beam: | 39.5 ft (12.0 m) |
| Draft: | 12.5 ft (3.8 m) |
| Propulsion: | 4 Babcock & Wilcox oil-fired boilers; 2 General Electric geared steam turbines; 2 screws; =60,000shp |
| Speed: | 36.5 knots (67.6 km/h) |
| Range: | 5,500 miles at 15 knots (8,850 km at 28 km/h) |
| Complement: | 329 officers and men |
| Armament: | • 5 × single 5 inch/38 caliber guns guided by a Mark 37 Gun Fire Control System with Mk25 fire control radar linked by a Mark 1A Fire Control Computer stabilized by a Mk6 8,500 rpm gyro. • 6–10 × 40 mm Bofors AA guns (early ships carried 4 × 1.1 inch/75 caliber guns), • 7–10 × 20 mm Oerlikon cannons, • 10 × 21 inch torpedo tubes (2×5), • 6 × K-guns, • 2 × depth charge racks |
The Fletcher class were a class of destroyers built by the United States during World War II. The class was designed in 1939 as a result of dissatisfaction with the earlier destroyer leader types. Some went on to serve during the Korean War and into the Vietnam War.
The United States Navy commissioned 175 Fletcher-class destroyers between 1942 and 1944, more than any other destroyer class, and the Fletcher design was generally regarded as highly successful. The Fletcher class had a design speed of 38 knots, armed with five 5" guns in single mounts and carrying 10 21" torpedo in twin quintuple centerline mounts. The Allen M. Sumner- and Gearing classes were Fletcher derivatives.
The long-range Fletcher-class ships would participate in battles in every aspect that could be asked of a destroyer, from anti-submarine warfare and anti-aircraft warfare to surface actions. They could cover the vast distances required by fleet actions in the Pacific. In fact, they served almost exclusively in the Pacific Theater of Operations during World War II, during which they accounted for 29 Imperial Japanese Navy submarines sunk. In a massive effort, the Fletcher-class ships were built by shipyards across the United States and, after World War II ended, many were sold to the very countries they had fought against: Italy, Germany, and Japan, as well as other navies, where they would go on to have even longer, distinguished careers.
Three have been preserved as museum ships in the US, and one in Greece.
Read more about Fletcher Class Destroyer: Description, Design, Other Navies
Famous quotes containing the words class and/or destroyer:
“A theory of the middle class: that it is not to be determined by its financial situation but rather by its relation to government. That is, one could shade down from an actual ruling or governing class to a class hopelessly out of relation to government, thinking of gov’t as beyond its control, of itself as wholly controlled by gov’t. Somewhere in between and in gradations is the group that has the sense that gov’t exists for it, and shapes its consciousness accordingly.”
—Lionel Trilling (1905–1975)
“There is a concept that is the corrupter and destroyer of all others. I speak not of Evil, whose limited empire is that of ethics; I speak of the infinite.”
—Jorge Luis Borges (1899–1986)