Battles of the CV Saratoga

The Saratoga is a missing element for the Pacific fleet in the early part of the campaign, to my knowledge she missed out on Coral Sea, Midway, and Guadalcanal. How much of the war did the Saratoga actually take part in. I believe I heard of two times that she was either hit by a bomb or struck with a torpedo and sent back to the west coast for repairs that had her laid up for months at a time. Did she distinguish herself later in the war, perhaps in battles where the fleets were so massive that no mention of her in particular are made?

 

She had an active career: USS Saratoga (CV-3) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Highlights include the raid on Rabaul in 1943, serving with the British for a time, and pioneering night operations, for which her unique silhouette may have been helpful.

 

The USS Saratoga was hit by Japanese submarine torpedoes on two separate occasions early in the Pacific War - January 11, 1942 & August 31, 1942. The first incident was enough to just keep her out of the Battle of Midway - she was hurriedly dispatched from the West Coast upon completion of repairs and working up, arriving at Pearl Harbor on June 6, 1942, just as Midway had finished. Here is a photo of her arriving at Pearl on the 6th: http://www.history.navy.mil/photos/images/g10000/g10121.jpg

It is worth noting that the damage was not that bad, but the US Navy took this time to give the USS Saratoga a thorough overhaul and modernization that kept her out of action for far longer than it took to repair the original damage.

Not to steal Opana's thunder, but you can find Damage Report #3 - the preliminary report on the January 11th incident and Damage Report #19 - the final report on the January 11th torpedoing using archive.org's "Wayback Machine" to view cached files from the NAVSEA's "Damage Control and Fire Protection Engineering" website(they used to contain a good many of the Damage Reports, but the have long since been removed).

Regretfully, these two files do not contain the photographs included in the Reports #3 & #19.
Damage Report #3: http://web.archive.org/web/20040119203502/http://www.dcfp.navy.mil/mc/museum/War_Damage/3.pdf
Damage Report #19: http://web.archive.org/web/20040119205454/http://www.dcfp.navy.mil/mc/museum/War_Damage/19.pdf

Edit, the photos have to be accessed separately from the reports.
Photos for #3: http://web.archive.org/web/20030908...in/WarGallery.cgi?category=3&cols=3&PgConst=9
Photos for #19: http://web.archive.org/web/20030908...n/WarGallery.cgi?category=19&cols=3&PgConst=7


OpanaPointer, if it helps you in any way, here is the "Wayback Machine" link to the Damage Reports parent page. Hopefully, they have some reports that you don't, and this will facilitate a quick and easy transfer of said reports:
http://web.archive.org/web/20040102033228/http://www.dcfp.navy.mil/cgi-bin/WarSummary.cgi

 

The Saratoga was an active participant in the Gaudalcanal campaign right up to its torpedo hit on Aug 26th. On Aug 24th, it was one of the carriers involved in the Battle of the Eastern Solomons.

 

Also not trying to steal thunder, but I have a Puget Sound report on the January 1942 torpedo shot posted here; it's not as detailed as the BuShips report, but the photo quality is probably better.

 

Thank you gentlemen for the reports and info, this helps me to understand a lot more of her role in the Pacific.