The Pacific War Online Encyclopedia
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U.S. Navy (DANFS). Via Navsource.org
In the U.S. Navy, fast seaplane tenders were old destroyers of the Clemson class that were converted to seaplane tenders. They landed most of their armament, particularly their torpedoes, and replaced two boilers with gasoline storage at the cost of five knots of speed. They could not tend as many flying boats as a regular seaplane tender, and they lacked the ability to hoist a seaplane aboard for maintenance, but they could quickly reach a remote anchorage to set up operations. This gave them some potential as fleet scouts, but there were no particularly remarkable successes in this role for these ships.
They were strictly an American concept. The Japanese had an extensive program of conventional seaplane tenders as well as seaplane carriers instead.
References
The Pacific War Online Encyclopedia © 2006, 2010 by Kent G. Budge. Index
