USS Gambier Bay (CVE 73)

On the morning of October 25, 1944,USS Gambier Bay (CVE 73) was steaming off the island of Samar with her task unit "Taffy 3". At 0647 she received word that a sizeable Japanese fleet was approaching from the northwest. Comprised of 4 battleships, 8 cruisers, and eleven destroyers, Vice Admiral Takeo Kurita's Japanese Centre Force steadily closed and at 0658 opened fire on "Taffy 3." Gambier Bay launched the aircraft of Composite Squadron VC-10 from within the safety of a driving rain squall. Unable to top 18 knots, she was easy game for the much faster Japanese warships. This mis-match in speed soon became evident when the task unit exited the rain squall at about 0730. By 0820 she was within range of accurate 8-inch heavy cruiser gunfire, was hit repeatedly and was soon dead in the water. She capsized and sank at 0907 as the only U.S. carrier sunk by gunfire in World War 2

    Bibliography:

    Magazine References: +

  • Airfix Magazines (English) - http://www.airfix.com/
  • Avions (French) - http://www.aerostories.org/~aerobiblio/rubrique10.html
  • FlyPast (English) - http://www.flypast.com/
  • Flugzeug Publikations GmbH (German) - http://vdmedien.com/flugzeug-publikations-gmbh-hersteller_verlag-vdm-heinz-nickel-33.html
  • Flugzeug Classic (German) - http://www.flugzeugclassic.de/
  • Klassiker (German) - http://shop.flugrevue.de/abo/klassiker-der-luftfahrt
  • Le Fana de L'Aviation (French) - http://boutique.editions-lariviere.fr/site/abonnement-le-fana-de-l-aviation-626-4-6.html
  • Le Fana de L'Aviation (French) - http://www.pdfmagazines.org/tags/Le+Fana+De+L+Aviation/
  • Osprey (English) - http://www.ospreypublishing.com/
  • Revi Magazines (Czech) - http://www.revi.cz/

    Web References: +

  • http://www.acesofww2.com/
  • http://www.navsource.org/archives/
  • http://www.battle-fleet.com/
  • Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/

 

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This webpage was updated 14th January 2017