USS Alhena (AKA-9)

USS Alhena (AKA-9)



USS Alhena (AKA-9)
Career
Name: USS Alhena
Namesake: Alhena
Builder: Bethlehem Sparrows Point Shipyard, Maryland
Laid down: 19 June 1940
Launched: 18 January 1941
Acquired: 31 May 1941
Commissioned: 15 June 1941
Decommissioned: 22 May 1946
Reclassified: AKA-9, 26 November 1942
Struck: 15 August 1946
Honors and
awards:
5 battle stars (World War II)
Fate: Sold into merchant service, October 1947
Scrapped, 1971
General characteristics
Type: Type C2 ship
Displacement: 15,080 long tons (15,322 t)
Length: 479 ft 8 in (146.20 m)
Beam: 66 ft (20 m)
Draft: 27 ft 1 in (8.26 m)
Speed: 16.6 knots (30.7 km/h; 19.1 mph)
Complement: 446
Armament: 1 × 5"/38 caliber gun mount

USS Alhena (AKA-9) was an attack cargo ship named after Alhena, a star in the constellation Gemini. She served as a commissioned ship for 5 years and 4 months.

Laid down as Robin Kettering under a Maritime Commission contract (MC hull 74) on 19 June 1940 at Bethlehem Sparrows Point Shipyard, Maryland, by the Bethlehem Shipbuilding Corporation; launched on 18 January 1941; sponsored by Mrs. William Sanford Lewis; purchased by the Navy on 31 May 1941 from the Robin Line of the Seas Shipping Co., Inc., of New York City; commissioned as Alhena (AK-26) at Hoboken, N.J., on 15 June 1941, Comdr. Charles B. Hunt in command.

Read more about USS Alhena (AKA-9):  Service History