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Enterprise carrying spares at Santa Cruz???

Discussion in 'Ships & Shipborne Weaponry' started by ickysdad, Jan 1, 2012.

  1. ickysdad

    ickysdad Member

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    I've read a couple of sources stating that Enterprise carried 14 spares hanging from the hangar roof at the Battle of Santa Cruz along with 81 operational aircraft . My question is how long did it take to get those spares ready for battle?
     
  2. Markus Becker

    Markus Becker Member

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    If the spares were hanging under the roof of the hangar not long. Lower them down, put in avgas and ammo, do the usual checks and off you go. Dissasembled planes would take longer, especially if they are in a hold.
     
  3. Gromit801

    Gromit801 Member

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    There was a combination of assembled spares, and "some assembly required" spares. The latter was brought out when the battle was over, and there was time to replace some losses.
     
  4. mikebatzel

    mikebatzel Dreadnaught

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    I would think that they would have been prepared overnight just before the actual battle commenced. Enterprise lost 11 aircraft on the 25th. Six in a failed strike attempt that should have been recalled, and five others through normal operations. If she had more planes to make ready, I'm sure every effort would have been made to get them into the upcoming fight.
     
  5. Gromit801

    Gromit801 Member

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    A lot of it has to do with time, and space. You have repairable aircraft that will come first, and they will take up the hangar deck.
     
  6. ResearcherAtLarge

    ResearcherAtLarge Member

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    If that number is true then it would have taken longer, as they would have needed to disassemble them to get that many into the overheads. I've got a copy of the hangar and gallery deck "as built" plans or CV-5/6 and it's hard to get a "maximum" count as they were drawn showing some of the biplanes instead of the monoplanes, which took up twice as much room. You can see a photo of some of Yorktown's aircraft dismantled in the background of this photograph.

    Aircraft weight dictated a lot for ship stability, so I'm not sure of the true maximum, but counting "bays" in the overhead it looks like the class could carry about 18 in the aft overheads and at least 8 in the forward area, although my plans in this area are chopped off due to how the Navy cut up the plans to put on Microfilm.
     
  7. Gromit801

    Gromit801 Member

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    I've seen photos of fully assembled, ready to go SBD's in the overheads, and partially dismantled TBD's and F4F's in the overhead.
     
  8. CTBurke

    CTBurke Member

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    And of course the overhead planes would hardly be needed by the END of the Santa Cruz battle, as every Hornet plane that could be brought aboard the Enterprise filled up available space!!
     

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