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Ships of the World: An Historical Encyclopedia

USS Ranger (CV-4)

Ranger-class aircraft carrier (3m/6f) L/B/D: 769 × 81.7 (86ew) × 19.7 (234.4m × 24.9m (26.2m) × 6m) Tons: 14,500 disp Hull: steel Comp: 1,788-2,461 Arm: 76 aircraft; 8 × 5, 40 mg Armor: 2 belt; 1 flight deck Mach: geared turbines, 53,500 shp, 2 shafts; 29 kts Built: Newport News Shipbuilding & Dry Dock Co., Newport News, Va.; 1934.

The sixth USS Ranger was the fourth American aircraft carrier built, but the first to be designed as such from the keel up. Among her other innovations was the addition of a gallery deck for the defensive armament just below the flight deck. Her most distinctive attribute was her six funnels, three on either side of the flight deck aft, which could fold down during flight operations. Though substantially larger than the escort carriers built during World War II, Ranger was too light and too slow to be effective as a fleet carrier.

Ranger began her career in the Atlantic before transferring to the Pacific, where she remained until 1939. She then returned to the Atlantic for duty with the Neutrality Patrol, designed to keep European belligerents from operating in American waters. After the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941, Ranger commenced four months of patrols in the South Atlantic. Following maintenance in Norfolk, she carried a total of 140 Army Air Force planes on two voyages to Accra, West Africa. In November 1942, she took part in the Allied invasion of North Africa. From November 8 to 11, her planes flew 496 combat sorties over targets between Rabat and Casablanca, destroying 85 enemy planes, scores of tanks and other vehicles, and disabling the French destroyer Albatros. Ranger's losses totaled 16 planes.

In February 1943, she carried 75 planes to Accra and, after patrols along the East Coast, Ranger was attached to Britain's Home Fleet in August. In October, she took part in raids on German shipping near Bodö, Norway. Returning stateside in January, Ranger convoyed a further 76 planes to Casablanca in April. Refitted for service as a night-fighter-interceptor training carrier, she proceeded to the Pacific in July 1944. Decommissioned in 1946, she was sold for scrap the next year.

U.S. Navy, DANFS.



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